Following a recent call with Chinese leader Xi Jinping, President Trump indicated that China had approved an agreement concerning the ownership of the social media platform TikTok. In a post on Truth Social, Mr. Trump stated, “appreciate the TikTok approval,” without providing further specifics on the details of this asserted approval. A subsequent report from a Chinese state-run news agency also offered a vague account of the call but conveyed Mr. Xi’s support for a “commercial solution” regarding TikTok’s future. The report quoted Mr. Xi as saying the Chinese government “respects the wishes of companies and welcomes them to conduct commercial negotiations based on market rules and reach solutions that comply with Chinese laws and regulations and balance interests.”
The status of TikTok in the United States has been in flux since January, when a federal law came into effect mandating that its Chinese owner, ByteDance, divest the application or face a nationwide ban. This legislation was established to address national security concerns, including the potential for Beijing to leverage the app for propaganda dissemination or the collection of sensitive data from American users. President Trump has previously extended the deadline for this required divestiture four times.
Source: www.nytimes.com