The US government plans starting next month to extend restrictions on US exports to China of semiconductors used in artificial intelligence and chip-making tools, Reuters reports, citing sources familiar with the matter.
The US Department of Commerce intends to include new regulations, based on the notification letters sent at the beginning of the year to three companies in the North American country: KLA Corp, Lam Research and Applied Materials. Those letters prohibited the sale of equipment to manufacture microcircuits to Chinese companies that produce advanced semiconductors with processes smaller than 14 nanometers.
The new restrictions would also apply to Nvidia and AMD, companies that were also notified in August to stop any sales of their chips used in artificial intelligence to the Russian and Chinese markets. Furthermore, the regulations could even apply to companies trying to challenge the two firms’ dominance of such technology.
A Commerce Department spokesman said the US is “taking a comprehensive approach to implement additional actions to protect its national security and foreign policy interests” as well as prevent China from obtaining applicable US technology in modernization. military.
For its part, from the Chinese Embassy in Washington they criticized the “export control abuses” by the US government, and pointed out that these measures “violate the rules of international trade, harm global growth and harm companies from both countries. ”.
According to the technology expert at the American Center for Strategic and International Studies, Jim Lewis, the US strategy “is to suffocate China” and they have discovered that chips are the “choke point”, since in the Asian giant “They can’t make these things, they can’t make manufacturing equipment” for semiconductors.
The sources quoted by Reuters added that the US government is pressuring its allies to enact similar policies so that their companies cannot sell technology to China either.
More fuel to the fire: the US “would defend Taiwan”
This Sunday, US President Joe Biden stated that his country would defend Taiwan in the event of an alleged military conflict with China, in an interview with the CBS television channel. Beijing regards Taiwan as an inalienable part of its territory, and insists that any US negotiations with Taipei that bypass the Chinese central government violate the key principle of its one-China policy.
Although Washington does not diplomatically recognize Taiwan’s independence, it maintains a policy of strategic ambiguity towards the island, reserving the right to maintain special relations with Taipei, which, in its opinion, makes its own decisions.
Tensions around Taiwan were reignited in August due to the visit to Taipei by the Speaker of the US House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi.
Recently, the Committee on Foreign Relations of the United States Senate approved a bill that would expand military aid to Taiwan and thus revives tensions with China today. With this rule, Taipei would receive 4.5 billion dollars in weapons and equipment within four years.
(With information from RT in Spanish)