LONDON \u2014 Gavin Williamson, the U.K. defense chief fired for leaking security information, has denied any involvement in the leak from a secret government meeting about the Chinese telecommunications firm Huawei.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In a letter posted on his Twitter account, Williamson says he was confident that a formal and thorough inquiry would vindicate him. He says he appreciated being offered a chance to resign but “to resign would have been to accept that I, my civil servants, my military advisers or my staff were responsible: this was not the case.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Earlier Wednesday, British Prime Minister Theresa May said in a letter to Williamson that she \u201ccan no longer have full confidence\u201d in the defense minister in the wake of the investigation. In the letter released by her office, May told Williamson that there was \u201ccompelling evidence\u201d suggesting his \u201cresponsibility for the unauthorized disclosure\u201d from the National Security Council.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Penny Mordaunt, the international development secretary, has been appointed as Williamson’s replacement. She becomes the first woman to hold the post.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
An investigation was launched last week after British newspapers reported that the security council, which meets in private, had agreed to let Huawei participate in some aspects of Britain\u2019s new 5G wireless communications network. The government insists no decision has been made about Huawei.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
In a letter posted on his Twitter account, Gavin Williamson said he was confident that a formal and thorough inquiry would vindicate him of any involvement in the leak from a secret government meeting about the Chinese telecommunications firm.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":43816,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":46,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":[]},"categories":[160,46,11,36],"tags":[],"coauthors":[1438],"class_list":["post-20634","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-daily-news-roundup","category-europe","category-global","category-newsletters"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"EIBLOCQ6F5B6FP3UYKLPLB454I","arc_canonical_url":"\/global\/europe\/2019\/05\/01\/fired-uk-defense-chief-denies-tie-to-huawei-leak\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"\n