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The Chinese ambassador to South Korea on Monday met a lawmaker there who has advocated a chip alliance with the US, Japan and Taiwan, in a sign that Beijing is stepping up its efforts to dissuade its neighbour from joining the US-initiated alliance.
Ambassador Xing Haiming told Yang Hyang-ja, a Samsung Electronics executive-turned-lawmaker who is head of the Semiconductor Industry Special Committee, that China and Korea should “exclude external interference” when it comes to cooperation in the semiconductor industry, the Chinese Embassy in Seoul said in a statement on its WeChat social media account.
The meeting has taken place as China ramps up its rhetoric against US efforts to establish the Chip 4 Alliance, a partnership seen by Beijing as a plot by Washington to exclude China from semiconductor value chains. The US has been ramping up trade sanctions against China in recent years, banning US firms from exporting advanced technology to the country on national security grounds.