On Wednesday 19 March, around forty MEPs from Renew Europe, the EPP, S&D and the Greens/EFA wrote a letter to Henna Virkkunen, the Commissioner responsible for Technological Sovereignty, urging her to push Member States to exclude Huawei and ZTE from European 5G communications networks.
In the wake of the alleged case of corruption involving several Members of the European Parliament (see EUROPE 13599/8), there have been calls for further investigation into parliamentary ethics, in light of the steps taken in this direction the previous year following ‘Qatargate’ (see EUROPE 13400/21).
On the other hand, the presence of Huawei and ZTE (another Chinese telecommunications equipment manufacturer) on the European 5G network was already causing concern for the Commission, which considered them to be companies presenting a “high risk” of espionage.
The forty signatory MEPs are calling on the Commissioner to make the 5G Security Toolbox, which was adopted in January 2020, binding (see EUROPE 12414/7). This toolbox did not call for the de facto exclusion of the two Chinese companies from the network. Today, only ten or so member states have excluded them from their own networks.
“These alarming developments underscore the urgent need for decisive action at Union level to secure our telecommunications infrastructure against undue foreign influence and security risks. The continued presence of these vendors in our networks poses significant security threats, exacerbated by their deep ties to the Chinese state”, write MEPs.
To see the letter, go to https://aeur.eu/f/g10 (Original version in French by Isalia Stieffatre)