China on Thursday vowed to take necessary measures to protect the legitimate rights and interests of Chinese companies, in response to media reports that US President Joe Biden plans to add more Chinese companies on a blacklist created by his predecessor.

Biden plans to amend the investment ban imposed by former US President Donald Trump targeting Chinese companies that it deems to have military ties, aiming to keep a large number of previously blacklisted entities and add new entities, according to US media reports.

Asked about the reported plan at a press conference on Thursday, Wang Wenbin, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson, said that China will take necessary measures to safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of Chinese companies and firmly support them to protect their own rights in accordance with the law, while urging the US to stop taking measures that damage the global financial market order and hurt investors’ interests.

The previous US administration imposed an investment ban on so-called “Chinese military-related enterprises” for political purposes, which completely ignored the facts and the actual situation and seriously damaged the normal market order and harmed the legitimate rights and interests of not only Chinese companies but also the interests of global investors, including US investors, Wang said. 

Li Haidong, a professor at the Institute of International Relations of China Foreign Affairs University, said that one of the Biden administration’s current goals is to develop more comprehensive and strategic competition with China to contain China’s development and enhance its economic and scientific power. 

The US government’s efforts to undermine Chinese companies’ economic and technological development will not work and its plan will only cause losses for US companies and investors, Li said.

Global Times