US Attorney General William Barr on Thursday assailed Walt Disney Co and Hollywood studios, accusing them of “kowtowing” to the Chinese Communist Party.
Barr’s allegations are part of a sustained diplomatic and public relations offensive by the administration of US President Donald Trump against Beijing, which Barr accused of engaging in “economic blitzkrieg — an aggressive, orchestrated, whole-of-government, indeed whole-of-society, campaign to seize the commanding heights of the global economy and to surpass the United States as the world’s pre-eminent superpower.”
In a speech in Michigan, Barr railed against US corporate leaders who he accused of abetting China’s hegemonic aims, particularly in the movie industry.
Photo: AFP
He said Disney had initially resisted Chinese pressure not to make the 1997 movie Kundun, about the Dalai Lama and Beijing’s annexation of Tibet.
“But that moment of courage wouldn’t last long,” Barr said.
China banned Disney’s movies, leading to an apology from the company for making Kundun.
The management then lobbied China to build a Disneyland in Shanghai, allowing Chinese officials to have a role in running the theme park.
Barr said that the officials “display hammer-and-sickle insignia at their desks and attend party lectures during business hours.”
“If Disney and other American corporations continue to bow to Beijing, they risk undermining both their own future competitiveness and prosperity, as well as the classical liberal order that has allowed them to thrive,” Barr said.
Barr also criticized Hollywood studios for bowing to pressure to tweak scripts in return for Chinese distribution, citing two cases in which the nationalities of characters were allegedly changed.
Beijing objected to a virus in a zombie apocalypse film, World War Z, being shown as originating in China, while a mystic character, the “Ancient One” in the fantasy movie Dr Strange was changed from being Tibetan to Celtic, to avoid upsetting China, Barr said.
He also criticized US technology companies — including Alphabet Inc’s Google, Microsoft Corp, Yahoo Inc, Apple Inc and Cisco Systems Inc — calling them “pawns of Chinese influence.”
“All too often, for the sake of short-term profits, American companies have succumbed to that influence — even at the expense of freedom and openness in the United States,” Barr said.
Cisco rejected Barr’s allegation that it had helped build the “Great Firewall of China,” which Barr referred to as the world’s “most sophisticated system for Internet surveillance and censorship.”
The company “builds its products to global standards, and Cisco does not supply equipment to China that is customized in any way to facilitate blocking of access or surveillance of users,” Cisco said in a statement to the Guardian. “The products we supply to China are the same we provide worldwide, and we comply fully with all export control rules applicable to China including those related to human rights.”
Nvidia Corp yesterday unveiled its new high-speed interconnect technology, NVLink Fusion, with Taiwanese application-specific IC (ASIC) designers Alchip Technologies Ltd (世芯) and MediaTek Inc (聯發科) among the first to adopt the technology to help build semi-custom artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure for hyperscalers. Nvidia has opened its technology to outside users, as hyperscalers and cloud service providers are building their own cost-effective AI chips, or accelerators, used in AI servers by leveraging ASIC firms’ designing capabilities to reduce their dependence on Nvidia. Previously, NVLink technology was only available for Nvidia’s own AI platform. “NVLink Fusion opens Nvidia’s AI platform and rich ecosystem for
‘WORLD’S LOSS’: Taiwan’s exclusion robs the world of the benefits it could get from one of the foremost practitioners of disease prevention and public health, Minister Chiu said Taiwan should be allowed to join the World Health Assembly (WHA) as an irreplaceable contributor to global health and disease prevention efforts, Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) said yesterday. He made the comment at a news conference in Taipei, hours before a Taiwanese delegation was to depart for Geneva, Switzerland, seeking to meet with foreign representatives for a bilateral meeting on the sidelines of the WHA, the WHO’s annual decisionmaking meeting, which would be held from Monday next week to May 27. As of yesterday, Taiwan had yet to receive an invitation. Taiwan has much to offer to the international community’s
CAUSE AND EFFECT: China’s policies prompted the US to increase its presence in the Indo-Pacific, and Beijing should consider if this outcome is in its best interests, Lai said China has been escalating its military and political pressure on Taiwan for many years, but should reflect on this strategy and think about what is really in its best interest, President William Lai (賴清德) said. Lai made the remark in a YouTube interview with Mindi World News that was broadcast on Saturday, ahead of the first anniversary of his presidential inauguration tomorrow. The US has clearly stated that China is its biggest challenge and threat, with US President Donald Trump and US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth repeatedly saying that the US should increase its forces in the Indo-Pacific region
ALL TOGETHER: Only by including Taiwan can the WHA fully exemplify its commitment to ‘One World for Health,’ the representative offices of eight nations in Taiwan said The representative offices in Taiwan of eight nations yesterday issued a joint statement reiterating their support for Taiwan’s meaningful engagement with the WHO and for Taipei’s participation as an observer at the World Health Assembly (WHA). The joint statement came as Taiwan has not received an invitation to this year’s WHA, which started yesterday and runs until Tuesday next week. This year’s meeting of the decisionmaking body of the WHO in Geneva, Switzerland, would be the ninth consecutive year Taiwan has been excluded. The eight offices, which reaffirmed their support for Taiwan, are the British Office Taipei, the Australian Office Taipei, the
RSS