US ally Chile: We will continue using China's Huawei

By Vakkas Dogantekin

ANKARA (AA) - Chile will not exclude Chinese telecom company Huawei from its choice of service providers, according to a senior Trade Ministry official of Latin American country, Japanese media reported on Monday.

Speaking to Nikkei Asian Review, a Tokyo-based financial publication, Chilean Vice-Minister of Trade Rodrigo Yanez Benitez said his country is "receptive of concerns that some trading partners have", referring to the U.S. war on telecom giant Huawei.

"We have listened carefully to all of them," said Benitez, who was in Japan to attend a ministerial G20 meeting ahead of Osaka summit on June 28-29.

However, Chile, he said, was a "small and highly competitive and open economy."

Therefore, "we have no exclusions for countries when it comes to considering their technology," Benitez stated.

U.S. President Donald Trump has been encouraging the allied countries to take the same U.S. stance ever since his administration launched a trade war against Huawei.

However, in Latin America, the strongest U.S. ally Brazil earlier already indicated its stance on the matter by not excluding the Chinese company.

Commenting on the U.S.-China trade war, Benitez said it already had a negative economic impact on Chile as the conflict between the world's two largest economies caused a fall in the price of copper, one of Chile's main export products to China.