Be fair to Chinese telecom companies, China tells India
Beijing, Sep 19 : China on Wednesday urged India to provide a "level playing field" to Chinese telecom companies Huawei and ZTE that have been barred from testing 5G network in the country
The Indian government has reportedly excluded ZTE and Huawei from the list of telecom companies for developing 5G network in the country.
The move comes at a time when Australia has banned these two telecom majors from providing 5G tech equipment to local mobile carriers due to security concerns.
"The Chinese government always encourages its enterprises to abide by international rules and local laws when pursuing economic cooperation overseas. We also hope that relevant country could offer a level playing field, transparent and fair environment to Chinese enterprises," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Geng Shuang said when asked about New Delhi's move.
ZTE and Huawei have been accused by the US, Australia, the UK and other countries of snooping for the Chinese government. These companies, as well as Beijing, deny these charges.
After banning ZTE, US President Donald Trump in July allowed the company to buy US components. However, a group of US senators proposed a legislation to reimpose a ban on the company as it violated the terms of the deal it struck with the Trump administration.
The UK has already blacklisted ZTE. In reaction to India's reported move, the Chinese media has said this has been done to "please the US".
"India's alleged exclusion of Chinese telecom equipment companies from 5G trials will eventually hurt its own telecoms industry and it's a move that follows the US in terms of politicizing business deals," China's Global Times quoted an expert as saying.
"India usually blocks Chinese investment, especially in sensitive sectors, by using the excuse of safeguarding national security in line with the intention to please the US by adopting a tough stance against China," Tian Guangqiang, assistant research fellow with the National Institute of International Strategy at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told the daily.
Let the Truth be known. If you read VB and like VB, please be a VB Supporter and Help us deliver the Truth to one and all.
Gurugram Police arrest BJP Yuva Morcha member for spreading fake murder story on social media
New Delhi: Gurugram Police have arrested BJP Yuva Morcha member Hariom Mishra, for allegedly spreading a fabricated and communally sensitive story on social media about the murder of a college student in Gurugram.
Mishra who is also known as Shaurya Mishra had shared a collage of four photographs on his X handle earlier this month. He claimed that a 24-year-old college student, identified as Nikita Agarwal, had been murdered by her classmate Arif Khan in Gurugram. In the post, he alleged that the woman was blackmailed, forced into prostitution, gangraped, and eventually killed. He also claimed that Arif dumped her body in a forest. The claims were presented as being based on police sources.
The post went viral and garnering over 1.5 lakh views, and was amplified by several right-wing social media handles across X, Facebook and Instagram. A verification of the claims revealed that no such incident had taken place in Gurugram. A search of credible news reports showed no record of any such murder. The police said this news would have inevitably attracted media attention if it were true.
On December 11, Gurugram Police publicly refuted the claims through their official X handle. They stated that the information which was being circulated was completely false. The police warned that legal action would be taken against those spreading misinformation. Despite the warning, Mishra neither deleted the post nor issued any clarification.
Police in Gurugram confirmed Mishra's arrest on December 16. The police said a FIR was filed after he continued to spread false information about the alleged murder of a Hindu woman by Muslim man. Police said Mishra, a resident of Uttar Pradesh's Kaushambi district, is now being investigated.
Gurugram Police spokesperson Sandeep Singh told The Print that the accused had deliberately misrepresented facts and used objectionable content to spread hatred along religious lines. “Such posts can create serious disturbances in society, and the police take these matters very seriously,” he said.
A reverse image search conducted by fact-checkers at Alt News, revealed that the photographs used in the viral post were unrelated to the claims, while two of the images were traced to a Pinterest account belonging to influencer Maulik Chopra and another image was sourced from an Instagram post by influencer Shivam Thakur featuring a woman named Deepanshi Rawat. The fourth image was found on an unrelated Instagram page. The images depicted different individuals and had no connection to any crime.
Police said they are also investigating Mishra’s motive behind sharing the false and provocative content.
