Huawei Says It Is Reviewing Its Relationship With Fedex After Diverting Packages

Chinese tech giant, Huawei says it’s reviewing its relationship with Fedex Corp, an American courier delivery service after claims that the company diverted two parcels destined for Huawei address in Asia and planned to reroute two others.

According to Reuters, Huawei said two parcels sent from Japan to their address in China were diverted to the US without a detail explanation and attempted to the same with two other parcels. The Chinese tech giant provided Reuters with images of the tracking records from FedEx.

Given the current situation between the US and China, Huawei suspects that that FedEx must have been authorised to take such a decision from the US government, but failed to give details on why it thought the packages were rerouted. Joe Kelly, a spokesman from Huawei, told Reuters:

“The recent experiences where important commercial documents sent via FedEx were not delivered to their destination, and instead were either diverted to, or were requested to be diverted to, FedEx in the United States, undermines our confidence. We will now have to review our logistics and document delivery support requirements as a direct result of these incidents.”

Reuters could not verify the authenticity of the track reports presented as proof by Huawei. The tech firm further claimed that the packages contained only documents and no technology, a claim which Reuters could not confirm. FedEx refused to respond to the allegations. It claimed that the company policy prevented it from divulging a customer’s information.

In the past weeks, the trade war between the US and China has intensified, with President Trump encouraging the countries allies to disengage business dealings with Huawei. It believes that using the Chinese technology poses a risk of military espionage, an accusation which Huawei has repeatedly denied. Huawei has responded in defence that it has no ties with the Chinese government, military or intelligence services and works independently as a company.

The track records shown by Huawei to Reuters reveals that two packages sent between May 19 and 20 from Tokyo, destined for Huawei in China, was rerouted to Memphis, Tennesse, the courier service’s headquarters by May 23. The other images revealed that two other packages from Hanoi, destined for Huawei’s Hong Kong and Singapore offices ended up at the local FedEx stations in those destinations on May 21 and were tagged “delivery exception.”

“Delivery exception” in FedEx’s website indicates that an unexpected circumstance which could be a custom delay, a holiday and unavailability for pick up, affected the packages from delivery at the expected destinations. FedEx refused to give details on the exact exception with Huawei’s packages.

Huawei has lodged a formal complaint with China’s postal regulator, which says it is investigating the incident.