U.N. Not Cancels Partnership with Tencent: an Industry Insider

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BEIJING, April 17 (TMTPOST) The United Nations did not backtrack on its global partnership with China’s social media giant Tencent for its 75th anniversary observance, an industry insider who is familiar with the matter told TMTPost on Friday.

The news report was published without interviewing U.N. officials or Tencent personnel in charge of the partnership, the source clarified, in reference to a report published on the Foreign Policy website on Wednesday.

The report alleged that the U.N. has changed its mind on using Tencent’s videoconferencing and text services for its anniversary event in response to U.S. officials’ accusing the Chinese firm of assisting the Chinese government in social media censorship and digital surveillance.

“The two parties just need (more) time to arrange their cooperation due to the coronavirus pandemic,” the source said. “The entire world has never needed understanding and dialogues as much as now amid the global coronavirus contagion.”

Tencent’s clarifications come against the backdrop of a U.S. diplomatic war against another Chinese tech giant, Huawei, which seeks to build 5G telecommunications infrastructure in European countries and Canada. The United States has not provided substantial evidence to support their allegation that the world leader in the next-generation mobile network would pose a national threat to other countries.

Tencent has not responded to an inquiry from TMTPost about the truthfulness of the reported cancellation of the partnership.

On March 30, the United Nations announced in its New York headquarters that it would enlist the help from the Chinese social media and video gaming giant for its videoconferencing technology support.

“Today I am very pleased to announce a new partnership with Tencent, one of the world’s most important Internet and technology firms. This partnership will allow us to reach more people across the globe to hear from them about how we can do our work better,” said Fabrizio Hochschild, the U.N. secretary-general’s special advisor for the 75th anniversary, in a videotaped statement.

The video clip, which was posted on April 1, is still on the account of the United Nations on Weibo, China’s equivalent of Facebook.

“Through Tencent, we will be able to hold online dialogues across borders, across different age groups with many people all over the world,” Hochschild said. “We’ll be able to have access to better videoconferencing and digital dialogue tools. We believe that these global platforms can provide a vital venue for global solidarity.”

Under the cooperation agreement, the Chinese company will serve as a platform for thousands of videoconferences and online discussions of millions of netizens on the future of the international institution in the run-up to its 75th anniversary celebrations in September 2020.

Tencent is one of a few of international tech companies, including Twitter, Facebook and Google, that the United Nations has reached out to provide tech support for its 75th anniversary event.

In early April, the U.N. account on Weibo shared Tencent’s announcement as saying that the two parties will conduct “a one-minute survey to global citizens about their views on the biggest challenges the world faces”.

“This is the largest global dialogue to date and we will spare no efforts to provide technology support,” Tencent said in its official statement.

The 75th U.N. anniversary committee has received over US$7.6 million in total funding, including over US$3 million in contributions from countries such as China (about $300,000). The United States, which frowned on Beijing’s growing influence at the United Nations, did not contribute at all.

On Tuesday, U.S. President Donald Trump announced he would freeze U.S. funding to the World Health Organization, pending an investigation into China’s initial response to the Covid-19 outbreak.

A group of foundations, including the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, contributed nearly $4.5 million for the U.N. 75th observance.