NEW YORK — A landmark criminal trial of Chinese technology giant Huawei opened Sept. 9 in federal court in Brooklyn, with U.S. prosecutors alleging the company stole trade secrets, deceived banks and violated sanctions against Iran over a roughly two-decade span.

Prosecutors say Huawei committed racketeering, money laundering, bank and wire fraud, sanctions violations, and conspired to steal trade secrets from five U.S. technology firms between 1999 and 2020.

"Theft, lies, cover-up," Justice Department lawyer Taylor Stout told jurors in opening remarks.

The government alleges Huawei stole internet-router source code from Cisco Systems and took a robotic arm that T-Mobile used to test phones. Prosecutors also say Huawei concealed its true operations in Iran to move U.S. dollars through the financial system despite American sanctions, and supplied equipment that aided Iranian authorities in monitoring protesters during 2009 demonstrations.

Huawei pleaded not guilty to all charges and denies any wrongdoing. The company says the U.S. government is mischaracterizing routine business disputes and individual employee actions as a criminal conspiracy.

Brian Heberlig, Huawei's lead defense attorney, told jurors the case centered on "competition, not conspiracy. Innovation, not theft. Ordinary business dealings, not criminal conduct." He said prosecutors were "cherry-picking isolated events" and would "twist ordinary activities to try to make them look criminal."

Huawei's defense maintains that some incidents involved individual employees whose actions were addressed internally and do not reflect official company policy.

The trial is expected to last about three months. It overlaps with Chinese President Xi Jinping's visit to Washington scheduled for Sept. 23-25, which is expected to include discussions on trade, artificial intelligence, tariffs and access to critical technologies.

The case originated during President Donald Trump's first term. His administration blacklisted Huawei from U.S. trade in 2019 and pressed allied nations to exclude the company from their 5G networks, citing national security and espionage concerns.

Beijing has strongly opposed the prosecution. A Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson said the government "firmly opposes the U.S. side's suppression and containment of Chinese enterprises" in response to the case.