Pentagon Accuses "Alibaba" and "Baidu" along with Other Companies of Assisting Chinese Military

SadaNews - The United States released an updated list on Monday of Chinese companies believed to be assisting the Chinese military, including the e-commerce site "Alibaba," the search engine provider "Baidu," and the electric vehicle manufacturer "BYD."

The U.S. Department of Defense revealed these classifications just weeks after President Donald Trump met with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping in Beijing, as both sides seek to maintain stability in bilateral relations.

Trump invited Xi for a similar visit to Washington in September.

However, the issuance of the updated list could escalate tensions between the world's two largest economies.

This Pentagon release comes months after it published a previous version of the list which was withdrawn shortly thereafter without any explanation.

The updated list closely resembles the previous version published in February, with the re-inclusion of two memory chip manufacturing companies: "Chang Xin Memory Technologies" and "Yangtze Memory Technologies."

Republican Chairman of the House Select Committee on China, Representative John Molinar, stated that "this updated list of Chinese military companies serves as a warning to American companies, all levels of government, and the American people."

He urged American companies in a statement to "stop engaging with these threats to our national security" or risk "enabling China’s military rise."

The list also includes some major Chinese tech groups operating in the field of artificial intelligence, including Alibaba, Baidu, and Tencent.

Baidu described the allegations in a statement as "completely unfounded."

A spokesperson for the company said, "We firmly reject Baidu's inclusion on this list; there is no justification for it," adding that the company would resort to all available means to remove its name from it.

For its part, Alibaba considered its inclusion on the list a "mistake," hinting at potential legal actions.

It stated, "There is no basis for including Alibaba Group on this list. It is not a Chinese military company and is not part of any civil-military integration strategy."