The Wall Street Journal reports that China plans to begin offering the iPhone 5 in late November or early December, which would mark the entry of Apple’s latest smartphone into China. According to the WSJ, China was responsible for $5.7 billion in revenue for Apple last quarter, 16% of the company’s total.

Government officials haven’t offered guidance on when the iPhone 5 might win final approval. But China Telecom Chairman Wang Xiaochu said Friday in a brief interview on the sidelines of the Communist Party’s 18th Party Congress in Beijing that the phone should be by early December if not sooner.

China Unicom Chairman Chang Xiaobing was less certain. “We hope to offer it this year, but what I say doesn’t matter,” he said on the sidelines of the congress, adding that his company was waiting for the government to grant the remaining licenses for the phone to be released in China.

Via [MacRumors]