Senior figures in Theresa May’s cabinet deny role in leaking details of vote in National Security Council meeting
Cabinet members who were at Tuesday’s National Security Council (NSC) have been sent an ultimatum by Whitehall’s most powerful official to confess or deny whether they leaked a controversial decision to allow Chinese telecoms firm Huawei to help build the UK’s 5G phone network.
Cabinet secretary Sir Mark Sedwill is understood to have written to those present and demanded that they tell him by 2pm whether they were involved and would be willing to cooperate with an inquiry, prompting the five prime suspects to scramble to “categorically deny” that they were behind the leak.
Huawei is a Chinese telecoms company founded in 1987. Politicians in the US have alleged that Huawei’s forthcoming 5G mobile phone networks could be hacked by Chinese spies to eavesdrop on sensitive phone calls and gain access to counter-terrorist operations. Allies who allow Huawei technology inside their 5G networks have been told they may be frozen out of US intelligence sharing. Australia, New Zealand and Japan have banned Huawei from their 5G networks.
Related: The Guardian view on Huawei: if May wants to trust, we must keep verifying | Editorial
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