China's Xi promises changes to promote tech center Shenzhen

BEIJING (AP) — President Xi Jinping promised Wednesday new steps to back development of China's biggest tech center, Shenzhen, amid a feud with Washington that has disrupted access to U.S. technology and is fueling ambitions to create Chinese providers.

Xi made the remarks in a speech marking the 40th anniversary of the former fishing village adjacent to Hong Kong being declared the first area for the ruling party to allow tightly controlled free enterprise.

He promised to ease regulations to encourage new industries. He also called for “the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation” and “optimizing and upgrading production,” a reference to official ambitions to become a global competitor in fields from telecoms and bio-tech to electric cars and renewable energy.

Companies in Shenzhen including Huawei, a maker of smartphones and telecom network equipment, play a key role in party plans to transform China into a leader in telecoms, electric cars and other profitable fields.

That has made them targets of U.S. complaints they might be security threats or erode American industrial dominance.

The party leadership is issuing more than 60 policy changes or new guidelines, Xi said in the speech in Shenzhen to an audience of businesspeople and officials. He gave no details but said Shenzhen would have “more autonomy in important areas.”

The audience, all of whom wore masks, included Huawei founder Ren Zhengfei and Zhong Nanshan, a prominent scientist who in January became the first to publicly confirm human-to-human transmission of the coronavirus.

China's efforts to build its own advanced technology added to tensions that prompted President Donald Trump to hike import duties on Chinese goods in 2018.

Washington has blocked Huawei's access to American components...