SHENZHEN — Huawei Technologies is facing a public backlash in China after details of the dismissal and wrongful detention of a former employee went viral. The treatment of Li Hongyuan, who had worked for the company for 13 years, has become one of the most discussed topics in recent days on China’s Twitter-like Weibo platform. “Huawei has lost love this time round,” Hu Xijin, editor-in-chief of influential Chinese state tabloid Global Times, posted on Weibo. State media outlets later reported how he was detained by police on an extortion charge for 251 days last year after asking the company for a severance payment when he was laid off. The hashtag “former Huawei employee who was detained hopes Huawei will apologize” was viewed over 230 million times on Weibo in the subsequent days.

Source: National Post December 04, 2019 16:07 UTC