{ "error": "", "type": "text", "title": "Secretary Pompeo and British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab Discussion on the Future of the Special Relationship - China", "slug": "secretary-pompeo-and-british-foreign-secretary-dominic-raab-discussion-on-the-future-of-the-special-relationship-china", "text": "
MR GODSON:<\/strong> In terms of threat in the world today, when you look at great power competition, the sort of talk once again, your history has not come to an end. Rise of China \u2013 how does the Special Relation change in the context, from your point of view, in the context of new world threats of China, Russia, and so on? Perhaps not so new.<\/p>\n SECRETARY POMPEO:<\/strong> So I\u2019ll speak to this a little bit from the American perspective and our recent history on this. For the last now coming on 20 years, we spent an awful lot of time staring at the counterterrorism problem. Post 9\/11, we developed systems, processes, capabilities, tools to reduce the risk to the West and in particular to our own country from terrorism. I just talked about that work that we do together. It is phenomenal, extraordinary. The risk of terrorism in the world is lower today because of the good work we did in the United States, because of the remarkable work that happened here in the United Kingdom, and many partners who share our value set and know the risk from terror.<\/p>\n But times move on. And while we still have to be enormously vigilant about terror, there\u2019s still challenges all across the world. The Chinese Communist Party presents the central threat of our times. It is an enormous economy to which the American economy is deeply tied. There is huge opportunity for us to do really great, creative, innovative business work between our two countries. But the Chinese Communist Party, under President Xi, has made clear that they have an agenda that is not always consistent with the very values that Dominic and I have been speaking about this morning.<\/p>\n And so whether it\u2019s at the World Trade Organization, or whether it\u2019s in how we handle infrastructure and technology, or it\u2019s how we ensure that we have the military capabilities and how we manage diplomatically the set of relationships between our two countries, we have to collectively \u2013 the West \u2013 ensure that the next century is governed by these Western democratic principles. And that will take a concerted effort not just by the United States but by all of those who love freedom and cherish democracy and the rule of law to ensure that that remains the predominant model for the world for the next century. [...]<\/p> MR GODSON:<\/strong> On to Huawei. The \u2013 so much is in the detail on all of this. And just picking up on the earlier thought, we\u2019re having systematic noncompliance in respect to the Iranians \u2013 if there\u2019s systematic noncompliance by the Chinese, what next? How to handle that?<\/p>\n SECRETARY POMPEO:<\/strong> You mean with \u2013 broadly, or with respect to telecommunications and infrastructure?<\/p>\n MR GODSON:<\/strong> In the first instance, that, then more broadly.<\/p>\n SECRETARY POMPEO:<\/strong> So our view is fundamentally this: When you have a Chinese state-sponsored company deeply tied to the Chinese Communist Party to permit the private information of your citizens or the national security information of your citizens to transit a network that the Chinese Communist Party has the legal mandate to obtain creates risk, and it\u2019s why we\u2019ve been talking about this with the United Kingdom for so long. They\u2019ve now come up with a model they think provides the adequate protection for their citizens. We will continue to work down this path.<\/p>\n We \u2013 there\u2019s a long history in the United States too. We\u2019ve got an awful lot of work to do as well. We have to make sure that our systems are guided and bounded by the central ideas of freedom and transparency and security for our systems too. This isn\u2019t about any one company. This is about a model that the Chinese Communist Party has where they place requirements on these businesses that say thou shalt do, and there\u2019s not only a legal requirement but there\u2019s deep financial investment. You have senior leaders in these companies that are tied to the Chinese Communist Party. We think that \u2013 it\u2019s not about a technical back door. They have the front door. And so we want to make sure that when we\u2019re thinking about how we\u2019re going to structure our networks that we get it right.<\/p>\n The second piece of this is we all have to work together to make sure that we develop not only for next month or next year a sound set of alternatives that deliver best-in-class technology to every one of our citizens and our democracy \u2013 I\u2019m confident that we will get there. In many places, I think we are there already, but we have to do that. As I travel and talk about Chinese telecommunications infrastructure in Africa and in Asia, the world is waking up to this risk. When I heard some of these countries say it\u2019s free, I remind them that free things almost always have a cost, and sometimes that cost can be an individual\u2019s security. And we just need to make sure we understand it, we understand the systems we\u2019re \u2013 we are evaluating exactly what the United Kingdom\u2019s decision was on Tuesday of this week, and I am very confident that our two nations will find a way to work together to resolve this difference and deliver on behalf of our two people world-class, secure technology and infrastructure. [...]
QUESTION: <\/strong>I\u2019ll do my best. James Landale, BBC. Secretary Pompeo, first of all, now that the UK has agreed to give Huawei some access to its 5G network, is the U.S. going to make good on its threat to review its intelligence-sharing relationship with the United Kingdom? Is the risk of Huawei really worth endangering the Five Eyes relationship? [...]
SECRETARY POMPEO: <\/strong>[...] With respect to information and the Five Eyes relationship, that relationship is deep, it is strong, it will remain. With respect to American information, we, as I said in \u2013 when I responded to a question on Huawei earlier \u2013 we will never permit American national security information to go across a network that we don\u2019t have trust and confidence in. That\u2019s the standard. It\u2019s the standard whether it\u2019s a Microsoft system, it\u2019s the standard whether it\u2019s a Ericsson Nokia system, it\u2019s a standard if it is a Chinese system.\"
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