China Mobile playing dirty with iPhone retaillers in China?

According to iPhonAsia (translations of orig appreciated), China Mobile, the biggest mobile operator in the world with over 600 million subscribers, is telling its retail partners that it cannot advertise or carry the iPhone. China Unicom, the second largest Chinese carrier, won the non-exclusive right to carry the iPhone and began selling the device last month.

The distributors that received the China Mobile notice include: Gome, Suning, Zoomflight, Dixintong (our fav!) (D-Phone), Tongwanbao and Kinfic. The China Mobile letter further warns these distributors to NOT display iPhones nor any iPhone related marketing materials.

Many cell phone distributors received formal notification that