GOP Rep. Rogers unsatisfied with Huawei and ZTE’s testimonies on ties to China

The committee plans to publish classified and unclassified reports in
the beginning of October that summarize the findings of its year-long
probe into whether Huawei and ZTE’s telecom equipment would allegedly
open the door for the Chinese government to spy on American companies
and infrastructure. During the hearing, Rogers said overseas sources had
said the two companies’ telecom products used security back doors to
extract information from computer systems.

{mosads}He told reporters that there was “a lot of repetitiveness, a lot of denial” in the testimonies of Charles Ding, corporate senior vice president for Huawei, and Zhu Jinyun, senior vice president of ZTE’s North America and Europe operations.

Rogers was tight-lipped about the evidence the committee possessed on the two companies’ suspicious activities. He said the October reports would reveal this information.

He also didn’t provide specifics on what actions the committee would take if its investigation finds that Huawei and ZTE are linked to the Chinese government, and pose a risk to national security.

“Congress can do a lot of things, and it will be up to us to determine what best protects our telecommunications infrastructure if we believe there is a threat to both personal business and government information that flows over those networks,” he said.

Rogers called a position paper Huawei recently published on its U.S. website “good public relations.” The paper argued that Huawei was being blocked from making inroads into the U.S. market over “unspecified” allegations, and included a quote that reporter Edward Murrow used in a critical report about former Sen. Joseph McCarthy (R-Wis.).

“It doesn’t speak to the facts of the investigation and I believe people will be pleased with the report, [and] that it will be fair and accurate,” he said.