{"text":[[{"start":9.4,"text":"The Trump administration is removing export controls for the United Arab Emirates that will enable the Gulf state to access advanced American weaponry and computer chips, citing its support for the US war with Iran."}],[{"start":20.85,"text":"The US commerce department announced on Friday that it was making the change “in recognition” of the UAE as a major defence partner and “its support in advancing US national security interests, including Operation Epic Fury”."}],[{"start":34.400000000000006,"text":"The UAE government and “approved commercial entities” would be eligible for “licence-free exports, re-exports, and in-country transfers” of advanced weaponry, including unmanned drones, certain commercial satellites and spacecraft, “dual-use items” for oil, gas and nuclear power production, as well as advanced AI chips and servers, the department said."}],[{"start":56.150000000000006,"text":"The boost for the oil-rich Gulf state comes as Democrats in the US Congress have called for hearings and investigations into Emirati investments in cryptocurrency ventures run by President Donald Trump’s family as well as his decision to grant the country access to some of the US’s most sensitive technology. "}],[{"start":76,"text":"Annual financial disclosures released last week showed Trump earned $1.16bn last year from his family’s cryptocurrency ventures."}],[{"start":85.35,"text":"The UAE’s national security adviser Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed al-Nahyan purchased a 49 per cent stake in the Trump family’s World Liberty Financial for half a billion dollars in a deal first reported by The Wall Street Journal last year. "}],[{"start":100.94999999999999,"text":"The deal made Trump a “whopping $263mn windfall”, Elizabeth Warren, the ranking Democrat on the Senate banking committee, said in a statement on Friday. "}],[{"start":111.49999999999999,"text":"Trump authorised the sale of 500,000 advanced chips to the UAE a few months later."}],[{"start":118.49999999999999,"text":"“Now, Trump’s Commerce Department is giving G42”— the UAE’s flagship AI group, which is chaired by Tahnoon — “licence-free access to advanced AI chips and promising favourable treatment for MGX [an AI investment fund he controls], despite reported concerns about the diversion of sensitive technology to China and other national security risks”, she added."}],[{"start":141.14999999999998,"text":"US officials had previously limited the sale of advanced chip technology to the UAE over concerns that its relationship with China could lead them to share sensitive technology. The FT reported last year that US intelligence agencies in 2022 obtained information that G42 had provided technology to China that the People’s Liberation Army used to extend the range of certain missile systems. G42 strongly denied the claims. "}],[{"start":167.59999999999997,"text":"The Emirati government and US officials said the UAE had implemented stringent controls to safeguard the technology, and both have denied that Emirati investments played a role in securing the country’s access to advanced chips."}],[{"start":182.24999999999997,"text":"Former officials and lawmakers are sceptical. “This decision is impossible to justify on national security or economic grounds,” said Chris McGuire, a former top tech and export control official now at the Council on Foreign Relations. "}],[{"start":197.39999999999998,"text":"“Now it is likely that the world’s largest data centres will be in the UAE instead of the United States, and will be operated by firms that will provide backdoor access to China,” he added. “There is only one explanation for why Commerce made this change: the UAE paid for it.”"}],[{"start":212.64999999999998,"text":"Ryan Fedasiuk, a technology expert at the American Enterprise Institute, said the relaxed restrictions could risk transshipment and technology leakage to China. But he added that the backlash against building data centres in the US meant Washington had to lean on partners for global AI infrastructure."}],[{"start":231.09999999999997,"text":"“The Trump administration should have pressed harder for the UAE to expel [Chinese tech company] Huawei and enforce a stronger firewall against potential technology leakage, but the end result — chips-in-sockets, running American AI workloads — will make the United States more competitive with China, not less,” he said."}],[{"start":249.49999999999997,"text":"Trump’s annual financial disclosures “heighten concerns about the President pushing Congress to pass crypto legislation in favour of the very industry he’s cashing in on, the Administration’s moves to exempt cryptocurrencies and service providers from existing financial services regulations, and its steps to weaken enforcement”, Warren and other top Democrats said in a statement Friday."}],[{"start":272.15,"text":"Trump told reporters last week that large institutions managed his financial portfolio and that he had profited because of a successful stock market."}],[{"start":288.49999999999994,"text":""}]],"url":"https://audio.ftcn.net.cn/album/a_1783899748_6342.mp3"}