No justification for ban, say Chinese telecom equipment cos

Chinese telecom companies operating in India said there is no justification for India's security concerns about their equipment and the current de facto restrictions smell more of commercial fears, chinese news site globaltimes.cn reported on Monday.

The companies believe that the so-called "security concerns" were unjustified as Chinese telecom equipment companies use the same technical standards as other telecom companies. The Chinese telecom equipment had passed tests in Europe, where the norms were more stringent and this had been used widely in India's wireless networks for the past five years and demonstrated no security problems.

Sources said that the first batch of 3G equipment purchases from the operators with 3G licenses in India will begin shortly, and with such restrictions in place will result in chinese firms not being able to compete with other companies.

The Chinese companies also said that this would lead to cost escalations and also further dely the launch of 3G services in India.

Equipmet manufacturers Huawei and ZTE said they had cooperated fully with all the security checks and had suggested an independent security check from a third party. The Prime Minister's Office agreed to meet Huawei officials after meeting requests were sent to seven government departments, including the Department of Telecom and the Ministry of Home Affairs.