MALAYSIA’S Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad came out in support of Huawei Technologies Co., the Shenzhen-based technology giant blacklisted by the United States.

The Southeast Asian country will use Huawei’s gear “as much as possible” as they offer “tremendous advance over American technology,” Mahathir said at a forum in Tokyo on Thursday.

“We are too small to have any effect on a huge company like Huawei, whose research is far bigger than the whole of Malaysia’s research capability,” Mahathir said during a question and answer session at a conference sponsored by Japan’s Nikkei media group.

“So we try to make use of their technology as much as possible,” he said.

The public comments by Mahathir are a snub to the Trump administration’s campaign against the Chinese telecom network equipment maker. They also signal U.S. efforts to win allies against Huawei are flopping in some countries that are prioritizing development of 5G wireless networks, one of the firm’s specialties.

The targeting of Huawei by the United States has also complicated the trade war between the United States and China, leaving telecom operators around the world to decide whether to shun the Chinese equipment maker.

This week, Singapore-based mobile phone carrier M1 Ltd. said it’s open to more dealings with Huawei, while flagging that there will be alternative providers as well for 5G infrastructure. A day later, Japan-based SoftBank Corp. selected Nokia Oyj and Ericsson AB as vendors for its next generation wireless network, excluding long-time supplier Huawei.

Mahathir also visited Huawei’s Beijing office late April.

“We found that Huawei is very advanced” in the use of artificial intelligence, he said at the time. “We see there is an opportunity for us, together with Huawei, to improve our capacity in the fields of communication and artificial intelligence.”

Mahathir said the United States and “the West” must accept that Asian nations now produce competitive products, and should not “threaten” business rivals.

“Yes, I understand Huawei has tremendous advances over American technology even,” he said. “We have to accept that the United States cannot forever be the supreme nation in the world that can have the best technology in the world,” he said.

(SD-Agencies)