China team drafts ‘comprehensive’ sanctions list targeting US, allies on 63 tech sectors

Since US President Donald Trump launched a tariff war against China during his first term in office, Washington has steadily expanded restrictions on Chinese access to advanced technologies, targeting semiconductors, artificial intelligence (AI), quantum computing, aerospace systems, supercomputers and a broad range of dual-use technologies.

These export controls are aimed at slowing China’s rise in high-end manufacturing and frontier science.

But Beijing’s rapid progress in a number of strategic sectors has forced a dramatic shift: China is no longer merely a target of technology restrictions – it may also need its own system to restrict the outflow of critical technologies in areas where it has achieved global advantages.

A groundbreaking study on the matter, first published on March 19 in the Bulletin of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, was highlighted again in a May 21 press release published by the journal’s social media account.

The study was titled “Selection Framework and Empirical Research of Restricted Export Technology”.

The team proposed what it described as China’s first relatively comprehensive framework for identifying technologies that might warrant future export restrictions, ultimately producing a list of 63 technologies viewed as strategically sensitive or globally competitive.

South China Morning Post