HUAWEI CFO’S CASE FOR EXTRADITION TO US CONTINUES: CANADA COURT

A Canadian court has ruled on May 27, 2020 that the extradition case against Huawei Technologies Co.’s Chief Financial Officer (CFO) Meng Wanzhou must proceed, throwing a huge setback on her attempt to avoid extradition to the United States to face bank fraud charges.

The ruling, which could further deteriorate relations between Ottawa and Beijing, elicited an immediate strong reaction from China’s Embassy in Canada, which said Canada is “accomplice to US efforts to bring down Huawei and Chinese high-tech companies.”

Meng, a Chinese citizen and daughter of Huawei’s billionaire founder Ren Zheng, was arrested in December 2018 on a warrant issued by US authorities and kept under house arrest in Vancouver, Tessa Vikander and Moira Warburton of Reuters wrote. They accuse her of bank fraud for misleading HSBC about Huawei’s relationship with a company operating in Iran, putting HSBC at risk of fines and penalties for breaking US sanctions on Tehran.

Meng’s lawyers argued the case should be thrown out because Canada did not have sanctions against Iran. But British Columbia’s Superior Court Associate Chief Justice Heather Holmes disagreed, ruling the legal standard of double criminality had been met. “Ms. Meng’s approach ... would seriously limit Canada’s ability to fulfill its international obligations in the extradition context for fraud and other economic crimes,” Holmes said.