EU gives Spain 36 months to remove Huawei from its networks

Brussels sets 36-month deadline to purge Huawei from Spanish networks

The European Commission has approved new rules requiring member states to exclude suppliers deemed "high risk", including Huawei, from their telecoms infrastructure. Spain, one of the 14 countries that until now had ignored the EU's recommendations, has three years to replace the Chinese company's equipment. The deadline may seem generous, but the scope of the decision amounts to a political and economic earthquake.

A ban years overdue and 14 defiant countries

Brussels has spent more than five years warning about the security risks posed by Huawei and ZTE technology, yet 14 of the 27 member states — Spain among them — have kept awarding contracts to the Chinese firm. The new Cybersecurity Act classifies not only suppliers but also high-risk countries, ramping up the pressure on Madrid. Data from the thread show that, despite the warnings, the Generalitat (Catalonia's regional government) awarded a mega-contract to Huawei and the central government paid 12 million to safeguard critical systems. The question is whether 36 months are enough to dismantle a commercial relationship that, according to sources in the thread, has moved hundreds of millions in public contracts.

The cost of goodbye: who foots the bill?

Replacing Huawei with European alternatives such as Nokia or Ericsson comes at a price. 5G network costs would be "much higher" than with the Chinese rivals, at a time when several European governments, including Spain's, are weighed down by public debt. Some analyses point out that banning is the easy part; the hard part is funding home-grown industrial capacity, auditing software and guaranteeing technological sovereignty without depending on another giant. Because, as one strand of the debate notes, switching to an American supplier does not solve the spying risk: it just changes sides.

The Zapatero factor: shadows over the China relationship

The ban coincides with an ongoing investigation into the ties between former prime minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero and the Chinese businessman whom the CNI (Spain's intelligence service) accuses of espionage. According to published reports, the UDEF (the police's economic crime unit) detected payments and "oil quotas" in exchange for favours to roll out Huawei's 5G. In parallel, the European Parliament has censured Sánchez for maintaining contracts "strictly prohibited" by Brussels. The thread reflects a double reading: the EU's decision can be seen as a blow to Chinese influence, but also as a settling of scores with the *nomenklatura* that benefited from it.

A three-year deadline that smells like an extension

Some observers doubt the ban will ever materialise. Spain's track record of non-compliance (14 countries ignored the previous recommendation) suggests the game is not over. The Moncloa (the prime minister's office) has ring-fenced 81 million for the Social Security's Huawei systems and has just reactivated a contract with the company for Defence. Given this track record, the 36 months look more like a window for negotiation than a guillotine. But if recent geopolitics has taught anything, it is that long deadlines are often the prelude to abrupt moves.