Huawei CFO arrested in Canada for allegedly violating Iran sanctions, China demands release

midian182

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What just happened? To say Huawei has a strained relationship with the US government is an understatement, but things have just got a lot worse. The company’s chief financial officer, Meng Wanzhou, has been arrested in Vancouver, Canada, at the request of the United States.

It’s claimed that Meng, the daughter of Huawei founder Ren Zhengfei, violated sanctions against Iran. Techcrunch reports that she faces unspecified charges in the Eastern District of New York, where she had transferred flights on her way to Canada. She was arrested on December 1 and faces a bail hearing tomorrow.

This isn’t the first time a Chinese company has faced consequences for allegedly selling to Iran. ZTE was almost brought to ruin after the Department of Commerce banned all US businesses from selling components to the Chinese manufacturer for seven years in April. The firm had to pay $1 billion as part of an agreement to remove the restrictions.

Details of Meng’s alleged wrongdoings are unclear, but it could be linked to her time on the board of Hong Kong-based Skycom Tech Co Ltd. A 2013 Reuters report revealed the company tried to sell HP equipment to Iran in late 2010, and that it had close ties to Huawei.

Associated Press reports that China has demanded Meng’s release. The Chinese Embassy in Ottawa said Meng broke no U.S. or Canadian laws and demanded Canada “immediately correct the mistake.”

“The Chinese side expresses firm opposition and strongly protests this serious violation of human rights,” said the embassy, in a statement.

The incident arrived soon after the US asked its allies not to use Huawei equipment, which the government has long seen as a security risk. In August, President Trump signed the Defense Authorization Act, which bans US government agencies and contractors from using certain tech from Huawei and other Chinese companies.

With China and the US recently agreeing to suspend new trade tariffs, it will be interesting to see how this development affects the trade war. It’s already led to calls for Chinese consumers to boycott Apple products in favor of Huawei phones.

Responding to Meng’s arrest, Huawei said:

Recently, our corporate CFO, Ms. Meng Wanzhou, was provisionally detained by the Canadian Authorities on behalf of the United States of America, which seeks the extradition of Ms. Meng Wanzhou to face unspecified charges in the Eastern District of New York, when she was transferring flights in Canada.

The company has been provided very little information regarding the charges and is not aware of any wrongdoing by Ms. Meng. The company believes the Canadian and US legal systems will ultimately reach a just conclusion.

Huawei complies with all applicable laws and regulations where it operates, including applicable export control and sanction laws and regulations of the UN, US and EU.

Permalink to story.

 
Hmm... Even if she was involved in in selling to Iran she is not an American and did this while in China.

Is Canada going to start being America's ***** and start sending everyone who does not follow American laws around the world to American if they visit Canada? Sounds like a bad idea to me. I can not see this ending well for Canada to get involved in these kinds of situations.

If she had broken an American law while in America that would be a completely different situation. However this is more political than anything and Canada getting involved is just stupid.

As an added note the US Govt never found any hard evidence against Huawei to backup all the conspiracy rhetoric. The whole thing was driven by US competitors and paranoia. Not to say that I think China is above that kind of thing but that there was no hard evidence about Huawei being involved.
 
I like that China's defence is "this is a violation of a person's human rights!" when they currently have somewhere between 800,000 and 2 million people detained in internment camps for the crime of being Muslims.

Sorry China, which leg was that you were trying to stand on?
 
I like that China's defence is "this is a violation of a person's human rights!" when they currently have somewhere between 800,000 and 2 million people detained in internment camps for the crime of being Muslims.

Sorry China, which leg was that you were trying to stand on?

Like we're any better. China might be a half century late of farking their citizens over, but we are by far the king of that shiat.
 
I’m afraid, this exactly how I’ve always seen Canada. They are super liberal, friendly to everyone and whatnot – but – when push comes to shove, the tail doesn’t wag the dog.
 
Like we're any better. China might be a half century late of farking their citizens over, but we are by far the king of that shiat.
Who's the 'we' in that? America? Not my country, sir! We Brits traditionally either took a place over and subjugated the population to the Crown, or killed everyone. Camps are too much upkeep.

But realistically it's usually useless to look at past crimes in the modern context. Saying "we're just as bad" because your country did a similar thing 50 years ago is nonsensical. Your country is only 'as bad' if it still does those things. Otherwise there'd be no cause to stop doing the thing, if doing it and not doing it were morally the same. And *every* country has done bad ****, even peaceful loving nations like Sweden or the Netherlands. Either we judge historically and thus every country and its people are "bad", or we understand that progress can happen and judge based on the customs of the current day.
 
“The Chinese side expresses firm opposition and strongly protests this serious violation of human rights,” said the embassy,"
oh that's rich coming from them. Canada needs high standards while in China their human rights violations boggle the mind. The People's Republic's offenses are so numerous and vile it's shocking that we deal with the People's Republic in any way.
It's not just Muslims, Protestant churches are banned, and the Falun Gong spiritual movement has been banned since 1999 and its members have been sent to labour camps and prisons, and some have even had their organs harvested.
"The broad and sustained offensive on human rights that started after President Xi Jinping took power five years ago showed no sign of abating in 2017. The death of Nobel Peace Prize laureate Liu Xiaobo in a hospital under heavy guard in July highlighted the Chinese government’s deepening contempt for rights. The near future for human rights appears grim, especially as Xi is expected to remain in power at least until 2022. Foreign governments did little in 2017 to push back against China’s worsening rights record at home and abroad.
The Chinese government, which already oversees one of the strictest online censorship regimes in the world, limited the provision of censorship circumvention tools and strengthened ideological control over education and mass media in 2017. Schools and state media incessantly tout the supremacy of the Chinese Communist Party, and, increasingly, of President Xi Jinping as “core” leader.
Authorities subjected more human rights defenders—including foreigners—to show trials in 2017, airing excerpted forced confessions and court trials on state television and social media. Police ensured the detainees’ compliance by torturing some of them, denying them access to lawyers of their choice, and holding them incommunicado for months.
In Xinjiang, a nominally autonomous region with 11 million Turkic Muslim Uyghurs, authorities stepped up mass surveillance and the security presence despite the lack of evidence demonstrating an organized threat. They also adopted new policies denying Uyghurs cultural and religious rights.
Hong Kong’s human rights record took a dark turn. Hong Kong courts disqualified four pro-democracy lawmakers in July and jailed three prominent pro-democracy student leaders in August.
China’s growing global influence means many of its rights violations now have international implications. In April, security officials at the United Nations headquarters in New York City ejected from the premises Dolkun Isa, an ethnic Uyghur rights activist, who was accredited as a nongovernmental organization (NGO) participant to a forum there; no explanation was provided."
From Mao, till now, this is the Chinese government...…….
 
Who's the 'we' in that? America? Not my country, sir! We Brits traditionally either took a place over and subjugated the population to the Crown, or killed everyone. Camps are too much upkeep.
Actually, you Brits were one of the first nations to use the concentration camp - back in the second Boer War around 1900....
 
Like we're any better. China might be a half century late of farking their citizens over, but we are by far the king of that shiat.
Who's the 'we' in that? America? Not my country, sir! We Brits traditionally either took a place over and subjugated the population to the Crown, or killed everyone. Camps are too much upkeep.

But realistically it's usually useless to look at past crimes in the modern context. Saying "we're just as bad" because your country did a similar thing 50 years ago is nonsensical. Your country is only 'as bad' if it still does those things. Otherwise there'd be no cause to stop doing the thing, if doing it and not doing it were morally the same. And *every* country has done bad ****, even peaceful loving nations like Sweden or the Netherlands. Either we judge historically and thus every country and its people are "bad", or we understand that progress can happen and judge based on the customs of the current day.

Last 50 years? Do you not see the bullshiat going on in the US now? I'm pretty sure you guys know since your shiat tabloids love writing about the US.
 
Last 50 years? Do you not see the bullshiat going on in the US now? I'm pretty sure you guys know since your shiat tabloids love writing about the US.
Ahhh right, the (im)migrant family malarkey. Fair point. To my mind, hearing 'internment camp' twinned with the US, I think of Japanese citizens being held during WW2.
 
Start trade war with China. Profit from stock market dropping like a rock.
Start talks with China announcing a 90 days truce. Profit from stock market skyrocketing.
Do something to make your relations with China bad again. Profit from stock market dropping like a rock.
Do something to fix your relations with China. Profit from stock market skyrocketing.

Repeat as much as possible, but stop before others realize what is going on and throw you out of the White House.
 
There is no way she should be released. China is a bad egg and they need a taste of reality. Why should it end well
 
Hmm... Even if she was involved in in selling to Iran she is not an American and did this while in China.

Is Canada going to start being America's ***** and start sending everyone who does not follow American laws around the world to American if they visit Canada? Sounds like a bad idea to me. I can not see this ending well for Canada to get involved in these kinds of situations.

If she had broken an American law while in America that would be a completely different situation. However this is more political than anything and Canada getting involved is just stupid.

As an added note the US Govt never found any hard evidence against Huawei to backup all the conspiracy rhetoric. The whole thing was driven by US competitors and paranoia. Not to say that I think China is above that kind of thing but that there was no hard evidence about Huawei being involved.

That's the way extradition works. If a country puts out a warrant for your arrest - even if you are not a citizen of said country - and you live in or travel to a third country that has extradition with the first country, you likely will be arrested and extradited to the country the filled the charges. It is a reciprocal system that is designed to prevent people from committing crimes in one country while taking shelter in another. Obviously, like all international relations, sometimes politics interjects itself here.

In this case, violating sanctions is a pretty serious crime. With the way sanctions work, if the US didn't arrest her, Canada likely would have anyway. If you violate trade sanctions, every country that agrees to be bound by them usually agrees to also enforce them.
 
The Chinese government doing ANY business with Iran is humerus. Next thing they'll tell us the president of the United States has been secretly doing business with Putin.........?

John Stewart quit too early, this stuff is just writing itself.
 
She had not transferred flights in the Eastern District of New York on her way to Canada, as the article states. She had transferred flights in Canada on her way to somewhere else, which is why she got arrested by Canadian authorities and is now facing extradition to the United States.
 
America and the IMF and Federal Reserveare huge bullies and they demand you bully those they want to bully.

Economic Warfare is why Americans have enemies.

Not "religious fundamentalism".

There is nobody desperate to fly thousands of miles to commit terroristic suicide on American land just because "we are free".
 
Hmm... Even if she was involved in in selling to Iran she is not an American and did this while in China.

Is Canada going to start being America's ***** and start sending everyone who does not follow American laws around the world to American if they visit Canada? Sounds like a bad idea to me. I can not see this ending well for Canada to get involved in these kinds of situations.

If she had broken an American law while in America that would be a completely different situation. However this is more political than anything and Canada getting involved is just stupid.

As an added note the US Govt never found any hard evidence against Huawei to backup all the conspiracy rhetoric. The whole thing was driven by US competitors and paranoia. Not to say that I think China is above that kind of thing but that there was no hard evidence about Huawei being involved.

That's the way extradition works. If a country puts out a warrant for your arrest - even if you are not a citizen of said country - and you live in or travel to a third country that has extradition with the first country, you likely will be arrested and extradited to the country the filled the charges. It is a reciprocal system that is designed to prevent people from committing crimes in one country while taking shelter in another. Obviously, like all international relations, sometimes politics interjects itself here.

In this case, violating sanctions is a pretty serious crime. With the way sanctions work, if the US didn't arrest her, Canada likely would have anyway. If you violate trade sanctions, every country that agrees to be bound by them usually agrees to also enforce them.
Finally someone that actually has sense, we are all free to comment and say whatever we want, however the law is the law.
 
“The Chinese side expresses firm opposition and strongly protests this serious violation of human rights,”

How ironic. :facepalm:
Suddenly the Chinese are interested in HUMAN RIGHTS ?
 
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