The Internet company owned by Hong Kong's richest man, Li Ka-shing, severed ties with Google's search services Wednesday, sparking concerns that other companies may also pull away from the Web giant. Stressing its adherence to China's laws, Hong Kong-listed TOM Group issued a statement on behalf of subsidiary TOM Online following Google's decision to stop censoring its Chinese search engine on Monday. TOM, which runs online and mobile Internet services in mainland China, said it had stopped users from visiting its website through Google's search engine service. 'TOM reiterates that as a Chinese company, we adhere to rules and regulations in China where we operate our businesses,' it said. TOM Group is one of the key elements of the business empire of property tycoon Li, 81, who has strong ties with the Chinese government. Li was ranked as the 14th wealthiest person in the world by Forbes magazine in March, when his net worth was 21 billion dollars. Google co-founder Sergey Brin urged the US administration meanwhile to make the censorship row between China and his California-based company a 'high priority.' 'Human rights issues deserve equal time to the trade issues that are high priority now -- I hope this gets taken seriously,' Brin told the British newspaper The Guardian. 'Since services and information are our most successful exports, if regulations in China effectively prevent us from being competitive, then they are a trade barrier,' Brin said. China has attacked Google for stopping censorship of its Chinese-language search engine but said there should be no broader fall-out in Sino-US ties provided the issue is not politicised in the United States. China's state media slammed Google again on Wednesday, saying the Internet titan was 'not god' and accusing it of working with US intelligence. 'For Chinese people, Google is not god, and even if it puts on a show of politics and values, it is still not god,' said the overseas edition of the People's Daily. 'Google is not chaste when it comes to values. Its cooperation and collusion with the US intelligence and security agencies is well-known,' the ruling Communist Party's official mouthpiece said. The English-language Global Times, a subsidiary of the People's Daily, also hit out at Google, saying it had made a 'huge strategic misstep in the promising Chinese market.' China Daily relished the 'moment of peace' created by Google's decision, which came two months after it first said it had been the victim of cyberattacks originating in China and was no longer willing to bow to censors. 'Google's efforts to make this issue into a political spat have naturally met with strong opposition and criticism from the Chinese government and society,' the newspaper said. The paper slammed Google for offering China's 384 million web users access to 'pornography and subversive content,' saying the Chinese Web would 'continue to grow in a cleaner and more peaceful environment' without google.cn. A Google spokeswoman in Singapore declined to discuss TOM's decision, but said the search giant planned to continue serving mainland Chinese users by re- routing its service through Hong Kong, a semi-autonomous Chinese territory. 'We made this decision as a matter of principle, but we understand this is a complicated process with ramifications on the technology side and the business said,' she said. Elinor Leung, head of Asia Internet and telecommunications research with brokerage CLSA, said it was likely other Google partners, including phone giant China Mobile and Internet portal operator Sina, would follow TOM's lead. 'They want to play it safe,' the Hong Kong-based analyst said. 'China Mobile would likely terminate their mobile phone search. I think that would be the biggest loss.' Although Google's mainland Chinese sales are relatively small, China Mobile pulling away would be a big blow for the US company and present a major opportunity to China-based rivals, Leung said. 'The obvious one would be Baidu,' she added, in reference to the Chinese search engine. China Mobile did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Despite Google's promise of uncensored results, searches on the mainland of politically sensitive keywords continue to generate the browser message 'cannot display the webpage' -- suggesting China's 'Great Firewall' of Internet control remained intact. 