PRESIDENT Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva’s trip to China will include a tour of Huawei’s innovation centre in Shanghai, a visit that may irk the US which alleges the technology company poses a threat to national security.

The Brazilian leader will visit Huawei Technologies’s site on Thursday (Apr 13), a person familiar with the plan said, requesting anonymity as his agenda hasn’t been published yet. He’ll have a bilateral meeting with President Xi Jinping in Beijing on the following day.

Lula’s trip to China, a little more than a month after visiting Joe Biden in the US, shows the importance given by the leftist leader to both countries, which rank as Brazil’s two largest trading partners. His visit to Huawei sends out a message that he won’t pick sides in the US fight against the technology giant.

“We want to have good and close relations with everyone, everywhere,” Brazil’s Foreign Affairs Minister Mauro Vieira told a small group of journalists on Apr 5, in a briefing ahead of Lula’s trip to China.

A potential visit to Huawei shouldn’t be seen as a provocation by the US, he said before the meeting was confirmed. “If the president visits other countries, he’ll likely visit other companies.”

Lula’s decision to visit Huawei followed an invitation made by the company, which has been present in Brazil for over 20 years. In 2021, it won an auction to supply equipment for the implementation of 5G technology across the country. Also in 2021, The US Federal Communications Commission included the company on a list of five Chinese technology firms considered to pose an “unacceptable risk” to national security. BLOOMBERG

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