Huawei pleads not guilty to new US criminal charges in 2018 case

China’s Huawei Technologies, the world’s largest telecommunications equipment maker, on Wednesday pleaded not guilty in a New York federal court to new charges in a 2018 case against the company.

The latest indictment accused Huawei of conspiring to steal trade secrets from six US technology companies for two decades, lying about its business in North Korea and helping Iran track protesters during the 2009 anti-government demonstrations in that country.

Huawei had previously been charged by the US government with bank fraud and violating sanctions against Iran by using Skycom Tech, a suspected front company, to obtain US goods and move money via the international banking system. It pleaded not guilty to those charges last year.

At an arraignment in US District Court in Brooklyn, Thomas Green, a US lawyer for Huawei, entered the not guilty plea on behalf of the company and three subsidiaries, including Futurewei Technologies, its US-based research arm.

Huawei chief financial officer Meng Wanzhou is fighting extradition from Canada in connection with the original indictment in the case, which accuses her of misrepresenting Huawei’s relationship with Skycom to the global bank HSBC.

She has said she is innocent.