TECH

News agency reveals document proving Huawei's prohibited relationship with Iran 

Reuters news agency has released new documents at its disposal confirming Huawei's direct relationship with Skycom Tech, which has delivered prohibited equipment to Iran. Although Huawei calls Skycom “a separate local business partner in Iran,” documents received by Reuters show how the Chinese company effectively managed the company.
A document describes how Huawei, in early 2013, tried to "separate" from Skycom due to concerns about trade sanctions against Tehran. To that end, as this and other documents show, Huawei has taken a number of actions to hide traces of its activities in Iran, including the change of Skycom managers, the closure of Skycom's office in Tehran, and the creation of another company in Iran to receive tens of millions of dollars in contracts from companies.
New disclosures can be used in a criminal case brought by US authorities against Huawei and its Chief Financial Officer Meng Wanzhou(image above), daughter of the company's founder.
The United States is seeking the extradition of Maine from Canada, where she was arrested in December 2018. A Canadian judge allowed last week to continue the process, rejecting the defense's arguments that Maine's actions, of which the U.S. charges it, are not a crime in Canada. The US prosecution alleges that Skycom was Huawei's “unofficial subsidiary " and not a local partner. Huawei and Meng allegedly participated in a fraudulent scheme to obtain banned US goods and technologies for sale to Iran through Skycom and withdraw money from Iran by deceiving a large bank.
In turn, Huawei announced that at some point it was a shareholder of Skycom, presenting financial reports, according to which it sold its stake in the company more than ten years ago.
Skycom was headquartered in Hong Kong and ceased operations in 2017. She's also the defendant in this case.

Reuters: Jennifer Gauthier