China accuses US of 'political manipulation' after Trump's order against TikTok, WeChat

Issuing first response over US President Donald Trump signing an executive order banning American transactions with WeChat and TikTok’s parent company ByteDance in 45 days, Beijing on August 7 accused Washington of “political manipulation”. orders came after Trump ministration said earlier this week that it is gearing up to purge “untrusted” Chinese apps from America’s digital networks and called Chinese-owned video-sharing social networking service and messenger app as “significant threats”. 

Chinese foreign ministry said that it firmly rejects Trump’s executive orders and accused latter of “political manipulation”. According to reports, China’s foreign ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin said at a media briefing that Beijing will protect nation’s legitimate rights and interests of Chinese businesses.

But, Trump, on or hand, has said in one order that TikTok can be used for disinformation campaigns that favour Chinese Communist Party (CCP) ding that US “must take aggressive action against owners of TikTok to protect our national security”. 

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In a separate order, US President said that WeChat "automatically captures vast swaths of information from its users. This data collection threatens to allow Chinese Communist Party access to Americans' personal and proprietary information". This executive order signed by Trump would ban apps in US after 45 days "to extent permitted under applicable law, any transaction that is related to WeChat by any person, or with respect to any property, subject to jurisdiction of United States, with Tencent Holdings Ltd".

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Microsoft in talks with ByteDance

Trump's executive order came when American tech giant Microsoft is alrey in discussion with China's ByteDance to reach an agreement over sales of TikTok's US operations. US Senate on August 6 h unanimously passed a bill banning use of Chinese-owned video application TikTok by federal employees on government devices. Meanwhile, TikTok has invested a huge amount in Ireland to open a new European data collection centre amid growing scrutiny over its practices across world.

In June, India h also banned Chinese-owned video-sharing app citing national security and privacy as reasons following a violent military clash at Himalayan border with People's Liberation Army (PLA). India was reportedly TikTok's largest market.

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(With inputs from ncy)