China storms out of wireless standards meet

An international dispute over a wireless computing standard took a bitter turn this past week with the Chinese delegation walking out of a global meeting to discuss the technology, according to an AFP report.

The report said the delegation's walkout from the opening of a two-day meeting in the Czech Republic escalated an already rancorous struggle by China to gain international acceptance for its homegrown encryption technology known as WAPI.

The walkout followed Chinese accusations that a US-based standards body used underhanded tactics to prevent global approval of WAPI, the AFP report said.

The US-based group, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, denied any impropriety and said China was not playing by the established rules, the report said.

The report said at stake was a leg-up in technology research and billions of dollars in licensing fees and component sales for laptops, mobile phones, handheld computers and other wireless devices.