Telecoms.com

The US belatedly added Chinese gadget giant Xiaomi to its list of dodgy companies a couple of weeks ago, forcing it to call in the lawyers.

Having been thwarted by the Byzantine complexity of trying to get hold of US legal documents, we’ll just have to take the FT’s word for it. The complaint is against US defence Secretary Lloyd Austin, and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and, in common with many of Huawei’s objections to unilateral US action, bemoans the lack of legal due process.

The specific blacklist Xiaomi has been put on concerns one that claims to identify Communist Chinese military companies, but Xiaomi insists there has been no evidence put forward of this claim. Instead, it seems, merely the ‘Chinese’ component is sufficient to designate Xiaomi as too dodgy for Americans to risk dealing with.

Specifically this list seeks to prevent US citizens from investing in Xiaomi because that will just encourage them or something. It’s all very vague and seems to largely disregard even jurisprudence best practice so, in theory, Xiaomi’s legal action should have a strong chance of succeeding. Assuming Chinese companies have the same access to justice in the US as everyone else, that is.