The U.S. Commerce Department says it's removing China's largest listed telecom equipment maker ZTE from its trade blacklist.
In a statement, it added that it would further investigate former ZTE CEO Shi Lirong, whom it said approved efforts to skirt around U.S. sanctions rules.
In March last year, the U.S. Commerce Department placed ZTE on the Entity List under the Export Administration Regulations as it claimed that ZTE and its affiliated entities had illegally shipped telecommunications equipment to certain countries in violation of U.S. regulations. This made it difficult for ZTE to acquire U.S. products such as chips and software.
Earlier this month, ZTE reached a settlement with the U.S. authorities. ZTE said on March 7 that it had agreed to pay a criminal and civil penalty of about 892 million U.S. dollars, and an additional penalty of 300 million dollars, which will be suspended for a seven-year probationary period to deter future violations.
