The United States has raised “serious concerns” with the Maltese government over the island’s plans for close collaboration with Chinese telecoms giant Huawei.

A US senior administration official told The Sunday Times of Malta that in view of intelligence gathered by US agencies over the last few years on Huawei, which they see as a “national security threat”, meetings have been held with top Maltese government officials to “share the information and express our concerns”.

“During our meetings with senior Maltese figures, we made available our information on Huawei to the Maltese authorities so that they can have a better understanding on who they are dealing with,” said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Malta has an agreement with Huawei to use the island as a testing ground for the rollout of 5G. However, the Chinese company is under watch by several governments around the world over fears it is using its technology for espionage. Last week it was charged in the US with violating sanctions on Iran.

READ: No change in current relationship with Huawei, government says

The official who spoke to the newspaper dismissed the suggestion that the US could take diplomatic or other steps against Malta if it carried on with its collaboration with Huawei.

“We respect Malta as a sovereign and an EU Member State with a strategic geographical position. We don’t want to impose anything on the Maltese government and it is up to them to decide what they want to do with Huawei,” he said.

“However, we would not be respecting Malta if we didn’t share the information we have on the Chinese company. That way, the Maltese government can decide its way forward with much more detailed information.”

The government has signed two Memorandums of Understanding with Huawei but there has been little by way of public announcements about the collaboration.

MOUs were never made public

Not much is happening on the ground.

During the meetings with their Maltese counterparts, US officials expressed a wish for the Maltese government to be “more transparent” about its dealings with the company and to open up the field to fair competition under international procurement rules when it comes to major projects, particularly 5G.

Soon after taking power in 2013, Prime Minister Joseph Muscat had appointed Tourism Minister Konrad Mizzi’s wife, Sai Mizzi Liang, as his special envoy to China. Later, it was announced that through her intervention, Huawei would enter into an agreement to use the island as a testing ground for its 5G rollout.

No further details were given and the government has failed to answer questions on what this collaboration involves. The MOUs between the government and Huawei were never made public.

In 2017, the government formed a new company, called Safe City Malta, through which it plans to install CCTV surveillance in Paceville and Marsa in an experimental project with the Chinese company.

Despite this being a national security project, normally developed and administered by the police, it was assigned to the Tourism Minister.

Safe City Malta is headed by Joseph Cuschieri, CEO of the Malta Financial Services Authority and a close collaborator of the Office of the Prime Minister. Also involved are David Borg, a former personal assistant to Prime Minster Joseph Muscat when he was an MEP and now chairman of Wasteserv, as well as Jeremy Dalli, a businessman with interests in Paceville and recently appointed chief of staff to Economy Minister Chris Cardona.

The government failed to reply to questions about progress on this project, including the planned setting up of a Joint Innovation Centre and whether the Data Protection Commissioner had given the green light to experimental technology which according to the government has already been installed in an unnamed data centre.

Last week, Huawei hit international headlines again after the US initiated a court case accusing it of bank fraud, obstruction of justice and theft of technology from rival T-Mobile. This case is not connected to the perceived security threats or allegations of spying.

The company has found itself in trouble in several countries, including Germany and the UK, after intelligence emerged that it was using its technology for espionage, an allegation which Huawei flatly denies.

The man who founded Huawei, Ren Zhengfei, was an engineer in the Chinese People’s Liberation Army in the early 1980s – a fact that has worried businesses and governments.

Huawei says it has no links to the Chinese government and insists it is an independent company.

ivan.camilleri@timesofmalta.com