THE US sanctions on Huawei has transformed what started as a trade war between the US and China into a full blown tech war. The US has followed the additional tariffs of 10-25 per cent on $250 billion Chinese goods by putting Huawei, the Chinese telecom and mobile manufacturing giant, on the “entities list”, effectively a sanctions list. This forbids all companies having US content from selling to it.

THE latest round of US measures targeting telecommunications giant Huawei is an escalation of its war against China in the field of technology. Huawei has been the subject of US measures earlier too. While those steps were aimed at restricting the company’s entry into 5G networks in various countries, this round of sanctions is an attempt to deny vital equipment and software updates to the company, effectively crippling its core business.

OFFENSIVE ON TWO FRONTS

THE PepsiCo case against nine potato farmers in Gujarat for violating its Intellectual Property Rights under Protection of Plant Variety and Farmers Protection Rights (PPV&FR) has brought out the threat that the US multinationals pose to Indian farmers. PepsiCo is claiming damages of Rs 1.05 crore from each farmer. It follows an earlier case in May last year in Delhi High Court where Monsanto has claimed patent rights over its Bt Cotton seed and sued a Telangana seed company.

JULIAN Assange’s arrest by the UK police from the Ecuadorian Embassy after the Moreno administration withdrew his asylum, has drawn worldwide condemnation. Noam Chomsky, John Pilger, Nobel Laureate Mairead Maguire are among the leading figures who have condemned Assange’s arrest. In India, N Ram, Arundhati Roy, Gopal Gandhi, Indira Jainsing, P Sainath and Romila Thapar, condemning the arrest, stated, “His (Assange’s) arrest, and the attempt to extradite him to the US are, clearly, attacks on freedom of the press and its right to publish.”

NOW, that the excitement and self-congratulatory chest-thumping over India’s successful testing of its anti-satellite missile (ASAT) capability on March 27, 2019 has passed, except of course for continuous misuse in political campaigns by PM Modi, it is time to take a step back and look at the event and its strategic implications with a clearer head and a broader perspective.