Still subject to US sanctions, Huawei must also deal with certain tensions in France. Indeed, the French authorities are currently investigating the Chinese manufacturer, for suspicions of tax evasion and abuse of corporate assets.
Since 2019, Huawei has had to deal with the American sanctions decreed by the Trump administration. For Washington, the Shenzhen firm is guilty of industrial espionage on behalf of China. Because of his measurements, the manufacturer found himself persona non grata in the United Stateswith the prohibition to cooperate with most of its American partners, Google in mind.
Moreover, these sanctions have earned him the loss of his Android license, effectively preventing Huawei smartphones from offering Google services such as the Google Play Store, YouTube, Gmail, Google Drive and others. A short time ago, the Chinese company took stock of its revenues, in total freefall with a loss of 28% in 2021. Nevertheless, the manufacturer can boast of posting exceptional profits, which jumped by 75%. A fine performance made possible by the sale of Honor and other key assets such as its x86 server division.
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Huawei under investigation in France for tax evasion
In France, however, it’s not a party time for Huawei. In effect, the manufacturer is currently targeted by an investigation commissioned by the Nanterre public prosecutor’s office and led by the financial brigade of the Paris police headquarters. The origin of these investigations is a report from the French anti-corruption agency made in January 2021.
In the eyes of the institution, Huawei could be guilty of misuse of corporate assets and tax evasion. For the moment, this is a preliminary investigation and it will therefore be necessary to wait several weeks/months before having the end of the story. Note that Huawei declined to comment on this investigation.
As a reminder, Huawei is still under the surveillance of the Cerbère project, a national monitoring and action structure against Huawei interference created in 2015. This organization includes five ministries, namely Bercy, the Quai d’ Orsay, the Interior, Defense and Research, without forgetting the French intelligence services and ANSSI, the national information systems security agency.
Source: Challenge