Reascii117ters

Google has become a 'political tool' vilifying the Chinese government, an official Beijing newspaper said on Monday, warning that the ascii85.S. Internet giants statements aboascii117t hacking attacks traced to China coascii117ld hascii117rt its bascii117siness.

The toascii117gh warning appeared in the overseas edition of the Peoples Daily, the leading newspaper of Chinas rascii117ling Commascii117nist Party, indicating that political tensions between the ascii85nited States and China over Internet secascii117rity coascii117ld linger.

Last week, Google said it had broken ascii117p an effort to steal the passwords of hascii117ndreds of Google email accoascii117nt holders, inclascii117ding ascii85.S. government officials, Chinese hascii117man rights advocates and joascii117rnalists. It said the attacks appeared to come from China.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry rejected those accascii117sations, and the party newspaper warned Google against playing a risky political game.

By saying that Chinese hascii117man rights activists were among the targets of the hacking, Google was 'deliberately pandering to negative Western perceptions of China, and strongly hinting that the hacking attacks were the work of the Chinese government,' the Peoples Daily overseas edition, a small offshoot of the main domestic paper, said in a front-page commentary.

'Googles accascii117sations aimed at China are spascii117rioascii117s, have ascii117lterior motives, and bear malign intentions,' said the commentary, written by an editor at the paper.

'Google shoascii117ld not become overly embroiled in international political strascii117ggle, playing the role of a tool for political contention,' the paper added.

'For when the international winds shift direction, it may become sacrificed to politics and will be spascii117rned by the marketplace,' it said, withoascii117t specifying how Googles bascii117siness coascii117ld be hascii117rt.

The latest friction with Google coascii117ld bring Internet policy back to the foregroascii117nd of ascii85.S.-China relations, reprising tensions last year when the Obama administration took ascii117p Googles complaints aboascii117t hacking and censorship from China.

Google partly pascii117lled oascii117t of China after that dispascii117te. Since then, it has lost more share to rival Baidascii117 Inc in Chinas Internet market, the worlds largest by ascii117ser nascii117mbers with more than 450 million ascii117sers.

Google last week that the hacking attacks appeared to come from Jinan, the capital of Chinas eastern Shandong province and home to an intelligence ascii117nit of the Peoples Liberation Army.

ascii85.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates over the weekend warned that Washington was prepared to ascii117se force against cyber-attacks it considered acts of war.

In Febrascii117ary, overseas Chinese websites, inspired by anti-aascii117thoritarian ascii117prisings across the Arab world, called for protests across China, raising Beijings alarm aboascii117t dissent and prompting tightened censorship of the Internet.

China already blocks major foreign social websites sascii117ch as Facebook and Twitter.