BEIJING (Reuters) – Chinese video surveillance equipment maker Zhejiang Dahua Technology said the company and its subsidiaries have agreed to terminate or halt five projects they signed with local governments in China's Xinjiang region, it emerged on Monday from a grant application.
Some of the projects, awarded between 2016 and 2017, were terminated in advance, while others were still in operation, Dahua said in a filing with the Shenzhen Stock Exchange.
The company will halt the projects and continue with asset sales and debt settlements, the company said. Dahua gave no reason for the withdrawal.
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Dahua's statement came after another Chinese surveillance camera manufacturer, Hikvision, said earlier this month that it had canceled contracts with five local governments in Xinjiang. It was not said at the time why it withdrew.
The United States added Dahua and seven other tech companies to its blacklist in 2019 for allegedly “involving” “repression and high-tech surveillance” against Uighurs and other members of Muslim minorities in Xinjiang.
Dahua said the US decision lacked “any factual basis.” The Chinese government has repeatedly rejected accusations of human rights abuses in Xinjiang and criticized or attacked companies for removing companies operating in the region from their supply chains.
(Reporting by Beijing Newsroom; Editing by Tomasz Janowski)
