WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. Republican Senator Marco Rubio on Wednesday asked the Trump administration to review the national security implications of AT&T’s Inc’s planned sale of its majority stake in Central European Media Group Enterprises (CME) to the Czech-owned conglomerate PPF Group.
Rubio wrote the Czech company has a record of acting as “China’s proxies insides the Czech Republic” and added that PPF-owned telecommunications firms are working with Huawei Technologies Co [HWT.UL] to develop 5G networks.
The CME Group operates in the Czech Republic as well as Bulgaria, Romania, Slovakia, and Slovenia, reaching around 97 million people and owns some of most-watched news programming in Central and Eastern Europe, Rubio said.
AT&T did not immediately comment.
(Reporting by David Shepardson; Editing by Sandra Maler)
