China’s Foreign Minister Qin Gang has appealed to his Dutch counterpart Wopke Hoekstra to defend free trade after the Netherlands and Japan agreed to cooperate with US restrictions on Chinese access to advanced processor chip technology due to security concerns. In a phone call on Monday, Qin said that the Netherlands and China should “jointly maintain the stability of the international industrial chain and supply chain.”
China has criticized the US for attempting to block Chinese companies from accessing the most powerful chips and technology to help its fledgling industry make them. China’s Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning said that other governments have “deliberately blockaded and hobbled Chinese companies” and that such practices “seriously violate market principles and international trade order”. She appealed to other governments to “make independent decisions based on their own interests”.
A person familiar with the agreement told The Associated Press on Sunday that Japan and the Netherlands agreed to join in US controls. The Netherlands is the home of ASML, the leader in extreme-ultraviolet, or EUV, technology that allows manufacturers to pack more circuits onto a chip. The Dutch government has blocked the sale of its most advanced equipment to China under a security agreement that includes Washington.
