China Unicom ditches Google on mobiles

China's second-largest mobile operator has announced it will remove Google's search function from new handsets developed with the US company in the first concrete fallout of the clash with Beijing over Internet censorship.

China Unicom said the Google search function would not be provided on phones using the US company's Android-based operating system. Unicom said the handsets' manufacturers would choose which search engines to use instead. "We are willing to work with any company that abides by Chinese law... we don't have any co-operation with Google currently," said Lu Yimin, Unicom's president.