Google prepared to quit China over censor feud: executive

WASHINGTON (AFP) - A top Google executive reaffirmed Wednesday that the Internet giant is prepared to leave China if Beijing says it must censor Web searches or quit the country.

A Chinese flag flies over the company logo outside the Google China headquarters in Beijing (© AFP/File - Liu Jin)

"Google is firm in its decision that it will stop censoring our search results for China," Google vice president and deputy general counsel Nicole Wong told a key US House of Representatives Committee.

The company is mindful that it has "hundreds of employees on the ground" and understands "the seriousness or the sensitivity" of its decision but "we will stop censoring" search results in China, she said.

If Beijing's response is to demand the firm shutter its google.cn site and close up shop in China, "we are prepared to do that," Wong told the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

"We are not going to change our decision on not censoring results anymore," she told lawmakers looking into the relationship between Internet technology and aiding democratic activists around the world.