US Sanctions 11 Chinese Entities Over Links to China’s Military

The Department of Commerce building in Washington on April 10, 2023. Madalina Vasiliu/The Epoch Times

The United States is sanctioning 11 Chinese entities over their support of the Chinese military, the Commerce Department said on Jan. 3.

From Jan. 6, the companies and research labs will be added to the department’s entity list for acquiring and trying to acquire U.S.-origin items in support of China’s military modernization, the Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) said in an update.

One Burmese entity and a Pakistani entity are also being added.

The companies on the Commerce Department’s Entity List are subject to specific licensing requirements for the export, reexport, and in-country transfer of specified items, and the license applications are likely to be denied.

Of the 11 Chinese entities added to the list, Chengdu RML Technology Co., Ltd. has supplied precision-guided missiles and satellite communication systems to the Chinese military, the BIS said.

Chengdu Yaguang Electronics Co., Ltd. and its parent company, Yaguang Technology Group Co., Ltd., are accused of supplying dual-use electronic components to the Chinese military and other Chinese entities that have been placed on the U.S. entity list.

A fourth company, Hefei Starwave Communication Technology Co., Ltd., has supplied radio frequency and microwave products “explicitly for military equipment application” to the Chinese military and other sanctioned Chinese parties, the BIS said.

Seven Chinese entities are being added because they “have demonstrable ties to activities of concern, including hypersonic weapons development, design and modeling of vehicles in hypersonic flight, using proprietary software to model weapons design and damage; and otherwise supporting China’s military-civil fusion efforts,” the BIS said.

They are the Chinese Academy of Sciences Changchun Institute of Optics, Fine Mechanics, and Physics; Ji Hua Laboratory; Nanjing Simite Optical Instruments Co., Ltd.; Peng Cheng Laboratory; Shanghai Institute of Optics and Fine Mechanics; Suzhou Ultranano Precision Optoelectronics Technology Co., Ltd.; and Wuhu Kewei Zhaofu Electronics Co., Ltd.

In 2020, the U.S. Department of State warned about the Chinese Communist Party’s strategy of military–civil fusion, which eliminates “barriers between China’s civilian research and commercial sectors, and its military and defense industrial sectors.”

The strategy is implemented both by boosting China’s domestic research capabilities and by “acquiring and diverting the world’s cutting-edge technologies—including through theft—in order to achieve military dominance,” its briefing said.

The State Department listed key technologies targeted under the strategy, including quantum computing, big data, semiconductors, 5G, advanced nuclear technology, aerospace technology, and artificial intelligence, adding that the Chinese regime “specifically seeks to exploit the inherent ‘dual-use’ nature of many of these technologies, which have both military and civilian applications.”

In 2021, internal documents obtained by The Epoch Times from a Chinese municipal internet censorship authority revealed efforts to censor information about the military–civil fusion strategy online, in an apparent attempt to avoid providing details that could be used for targeted sanctions.

Meanwhile, the BIS is adding the Telecom International Myanmar Company Limited of Burma, also known as Myanmar, to the entity list for supporting the Burmese military regime’s human rights abuses by helping the regime track and identify targeted individuals and groups.

Pakistan’s Emerging Future Solutions Private Limited is being sanctioned for contributing to the country’s ballistic missile program, the BIS said.

In October 2024, the BIS added 16 entities from Pakistan for contributing to the country’s ballistic missile program or acting as front companies and agents for the Advanced Engineering Research Organization, which itself was sanctioned in 2014 for smuggling U.S. technology in support of Pakistan’s missile and drone programs.

At the same time, the department sanctioned six Chinese companies acquiring U.S.-origin items in support of Beijing’s military modernization, attempting to delay and evade end-use checks, and procuring U.S.-origin items for Iran’s weapons of mass destruction and drone programs.