China says Taiwan seeks to give away chip industry to US

BEIJING (Reuters) - China said on Wednesday that Taiwan was seeking to give away the island's semiconductor industry to the United States as a "souvenir" and leverage it to seek political support from Washington.

U.S. media have said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co, the world's largest contract chipmaker and a major supplier to companies such as Apple and Nvidia, has been in talks for a stake in Intel.

Neither TSMC nor Intel has confirmed the reports and Taiwan's government says it has not received information about any overseas investment application from TSMC.

U.S. President Donald Trump has criticised Taiwan for taking away American semiconductor business, saying he wants the industry to manufacture more in the United States.

Speaking at a regular news conference in Beijing, Zhu Fenglian, spokesperson for China's Taiwan Affairs Office, said, without offering evidence, that people in Taiwan were concerned TSMC could become "United States Semiconductor Manufacturing Co".

"In order to seek selfish gain, the Democratic Progressive Party authorities have freely made demands from external forces, using Taiwan's semiconductor industry and powerful companies to get a foot in the door to relying on foreign countries to seek independence, and even give them away as souvenirs," Zhu said, referring to Taiwan's ruling party.

While China claims democratically governed Taiwan as its own territory, despite the strong objections of the government in Taipei, Beijing has no say in foreign investment approval decisions by Taipei.

Zhu said Taiwan was trying to "sell out" Taiwanese companies.

"This sort of shameless selling out of Taiwan is in actuality pandering to the United States," she said.

Taiwan's Mainland Affairs Council said in a statement that TSMC was an "important Taiwanese company".

"In response to the challenges posed by Trump's new policies towards our semiconductor industry and TSMC, our government will work closely with industry to maintain Taiwan's leading position in the field of advanced technology," it said, without elaborating.

TSMC declined to comment.

The United States is Taiwan's most important international backer and arms supplier, though it does not formally recognise the island's government.

(Reporting by Beijing newsroom; Writing and additional reporting by Ben Blanchard in Taipei; Editing by Clarence Fernandez, Muralikumar Anantharaman and Christian Schmollinger)