Canada has arrested Huawei’s global chief financial officer in Vancouver
theglobeandmail.com
theglobeandmail.com
I'm partial to Iran because a multi-lateral treaty was signed. Iran stopped nuclear enrichment. In exchange, western countries pledged to provide economic relief and stop sanctions.
It is said that Iran has been developing various weapons, but these weapons do not fall under the treaty, and experts and controllers all agree the nuclear program has been stopped.
It is wrong for the US to walk away from this treaty, in the same way it was wrong to walk away from the Paris accord agreement. You agree on one thing, you have to follow. That is the honourable thing to do.
A few will say that Iran is threatening Middle East Peace. What is obvious is that its Saudi Arabia who's bombing its southern neighbour or sending tanks to Bahrain. If you want peace, you have to impose sanctions on Saudi Arabia as well.
What is even wrong for the US is punishing foreign companies wanting to do business in Iran. Perhaps there are technicalities to demonstrate a law in the US is broken. This makes sense for bureaucrats. For the rest of the world, it's just abuse and plain wrong. History will judge.
The Iran Nuclear Deal and the Paris Accords were not treaties. We have a process to ratify treaties in the US. The president approves a treaty and sends it to the senate to approve or reject.
It's easy for president to make executive order agreements because it doesn't require approval from the senate (something Obama knew he couldn't get for either deal). But all parties should know that these non-treaties can be undone without a second thought by a new president.
The nice thing about the American system is that while treaties are difficult to pass, they are more or less permanent.
U.S. treaties are not permanent, and while the statement as ratified, it is law, the U.S. has broken a lot of treaties treaties. See Native American section [4].
I can agree that statements like "It is wrong for the US to walk away..." are strictly moral, with no legal ground, as it was not ratified. Yet this is a treaty that was signed. In the eyes of the world and U.S. law, this is a "broken" treaty. And it doesn't help if we go around breaking treaties. It is not illegal, but you are not building credibility right? It might be only fair if other States start breaking their treaties when convenient. (And some of them do.)
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_policy_of_the_United_S...
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ratification#Ratification_of_a...
[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_treaties
[5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vienna_Convention_on_the_Law_o...
Edit: This is a nice interesting read, in case you are interested: https://www.asil.org/insights/volume/2/issue/5/international...
Worse, instead of owning to this change of mind, the rationale of technicality is used in order to justify pulling out. This is done in bad faith.
> The nice thing about the American system is that while treaties are difficult to pass, they are more or less permanent.
You say this now. This experience shows that, once you want to pull out, you will find a nice loophole to pull out. That is the "more or less" part.
And there is another aspect: once excuses for pulling out have run out, we know that the US will simply break, whenever and for whatever reason it wants, existing, ratified, seal-proof treaties.
The US is simply untrustworthy. And sneaky.
Remember Iraq WMDs?
2. The senate passing it makes no difference. The Republicans, controlling the House and the Senate, may well have been successfully in passing legislation withdrawing from the treaty. Except - that isn't even necessary. Trump can withdraw from any treaty he likes whenever it pleases him: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2018/05/0...
All of these are simply internal American processes, and it is up to the Americans to consider wether they want their politicians to run a foreign policy that projects stability, where the decisions of previous presidents are maintained because, being legitimately elected it was their decision to make, and American's word should stand for something - or whether they want their country to be perceived as erratic - which is in fact the case now, whether or not it causes allies such as the EU to ultimately make real changes in the relationship.
The Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty was signed in 1987, it is now dead. so by your definition, 30 years is now called permanent? To me, a far better definition of the term permanent can be concluded from the matter of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea - US permanently refused to join that convention.
(Almost?) All countries have a similar approval process in the parliament. Usually the president has enough votes in the parliament or has an informal arrangement with the opposition leaders to ensure the approval.
For example, Iran never ratified the 2013 treaty with Argentina. It was approved by the Argentinean Parliament, but it was never approved by the Iranian Parliament. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memorandum_of_understanding_be... more info in the Spanish version (autotranslation): https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=&sl=es&tl=en&u=htt...
[Disclaimer: I'm from Argentina. I didn't like the treaty, but nobody asked for my opinion.]
A Canadian Court will decide whether the US arrest warrant was based on common Western norms or not. In this case the arrest warrant was not issued for free speech, tax evasion or political activity so almost certain he'll be extradited. End of the story. Canada will determine that the person involved--essentially with billion$ behind her--will get a fair hearing in USA. And she will, laws may be unfair but...
But that's not the whole story with the Huawei CFO arrest.
China and their state-owned and state-controlled companies are stealing trade secrets and military technology instead of developing it on their own.
Chinese companies enjoy open access to Western markets, but Western companies are highly restricted in their access to Chinese markets.
If Huawei illegally sold technology to sanctioned nations, and the US can use that to pressure China on trade and espionage, more power to them.
Do you have any evidence for this? Have we arrested any US citizens for selling/leaking military technology to China?
please show me how Huawei enjoyed its open access to the US market.
if you like, I can easily show you tons of evidence on how Huawei's competitors say Cisco enjoyed its open access to the Chinese markets.
She has been arrested for violating a completely unrelated US law (in non-US territory).
NYT said NSA is hacking into Huawei's server steal information.
The company traded tech with the US under an agreement not to share said tech with sanctioned countries. They then proceeded in an apparent act of circumventing those trade agreements.
If they didn't like the sanctions against Iran then they shouldn't have been dealing with the US tech for which those sanctions applied in the first place.
Your argument is like saying "it's not theft because the person they were stealing from is a bad person" which isn't how the law works.
Funny how Israel never gets mentioned by anyone!
Iran stopped its nuclear enrichment program, so the sanctions were wavered. Iran continued working on a ballistic missile program (capable of carrying nuclear warheads), and continued destabilizing countries throughout the middle east (through proxy terrorism) - so the sanctions came back.
In other words - temporarily halting the nuclear enrichment program alone should not excuse Iran from being held accountable.
Pot, kettle, black. The US are continuously destabilising countries they don’t like, Iran included; in fact, most poweful countries do, all the time, from Russia to France to Germany. That doesn’t justify breaking treaties on a whim, like Trump has done.
The US had built up a reputation as a violent and aggressive bully after 2003. Obama worked hard at correcting that, but the new guy has thrown it all away again. The US at the moment look seriously bipolar, from the outside.
That is widely agree upon largely due to Iran's shipment of weapons and financing of external militant groups actively engaged in various conflicts. I am currently in the Middle East due to one or more of these conflicts.
I am not stating any opinion for or against the recent (now ignored) agreement.
> What is even wrong for the US is punishing foreign companies wanting to do business in Iran.
That is a gross over simplification of how the complexities of global trade does not always align with the interests of international politics. It is within the capabilities of one nation to impose laws that forbid trade and supply to another nation while trading with third party nations trading contingent upon that awareness.
Where is your proof on this? Where is all of the proof on any of the things claimed about Iran? Just like there were mass destructive weapons in Irak?? Sure, we know how that turned out. It's time for big ol' USA to just stop meddling in affairs it has no business in. They just want to get their hands on all the oil in the world so they can play the boss, and it most likely is not going to stop there either, next it's water, the market, and so on. The USA is just a big bully, it's their way or not at all. And Europe is like the bully's accomplice, too scared to stand up so just joins along in the bullying. Pathetic, more more more, it's always more they want. Protecting the peace, ha, joke. And while we are at it, let's forgive Saudi Arabia for obviously brutally murdering a journalist, afterall, they just invested millions on some of our weapons.
Farce.
> What is even wrong for the US is punishing foreign companies wanting to do business in Iran. Perhaps there are technicalities to demonstrate a law in the US is broken. This makes sense for bureaucrats.
Sanctions are powerful tools that benefit the country applying them in the same way that you benefit by not handing over ammunition to your enemies.
Extra-territorial application of law is a nightmare.
How would the US react if a US businessman was arrested for trading with Israel in Turkey?
I'd argue this is not as self evident as you imply for such "worldwide" laws. It's at the very least debatable whether a country should have the ability to make laws that apply to foreigners in foreign countries.
Like those charged under the Russian laws living in Europe? Do you see how problematic this idea is?
Keep in mind that US sanctions against foreign companies doing business with Iran are opposed by:
The United Nations International Court of Justice, which ordered the US to withdraw sanctions, to which the US responded by pulling out of international agreements.
The European Union, which has attempted to block its companies from complying with US sanctions.
With that said, the US is free to sanction anyone for its own interests, that's its right as a sovereign state. It is also its right as a sovereign state to refuse market access and trade to any company that violates its sanctions.
But arresting foreign nationals in other countries for violating US sanctions? That's the equivalent of Russia arresting American business executives and extraditing them to China for violating Chinese sanctions against Taiwan - and yes, there are sanctions against Taiwan, which are regularly ignored by the US, of course. This is a massive escalation and will undoubtedly cause a major international crisis. Stay tuned.
In this case, the other country in question is Canada, which has made its own sovereign decision to also sanction Iran.
Extradition treaties, including the US-Canada one, require that the conduct involved be a crime in both jurisdictions. If the Canadian courts decide that what she did is not a crime under Canadian law, she will get off. Simple as that.
There is no indication that this arrest is related to U.S. policies to sanction foreign companies for selling to Iran.
Rather, the arrest is far more likely related to "US law [that] prohibits exports of certain US-origin technologies to certain countries" (from nytimes article). Huawei purchased certain technology from the US with the promise not to sell it to certain countries like Iran, and then proceeded to shamelessly violate the agreement.
Without laws like this, sanctions are far less powerful, because any foreign company not affected by the sanction can act as a middleman between the origin country and the sanctioned country.
What the UN International Court of Justice and European Union think about US sanctioning foreign companies that do business with Iran is completely irrelevant, since this arrest is not related to that policy.
>>LOL, kill thousands of its own citizens in protests? The Chinese government never did that (even the famous tank man was unharmed and was not arrested), the truth is, many soldiers got killed because they were not allowed to fire at citizens. Even the Chinese government did kill its own citizen they learnt from the US (1932 Bonus Army, 1970 Kent state massacre, Jesus that was only 48 years ago, not mentioning almost every day someone is being shot by the police somewhere in the US. The funny thing is one shot won't even make it to the newspaper now.)
>>In a word, you have been brainwashed by your media. I know it's hard to wake up someone who pretends to be asleep, but it's good for you.
>This is ridiculous equivocation between a democratic society with a rule of law and an authoritarian regime. You're kidding yourself if you don't think the Chinese government has an interest in data owned by foreign nationals that they could gain access to.
No, it isn't. They're only equivalent if the American executive's company in question is selling, say, Huawei networking equipment (assuming it is banned; I don't know if it's the case) to businesses in Taiwan -- probably under an arrangement where the intention to sell to Taiwan was never made clear and likely actively concealed.
That's circumvention of export controls and likely fraud at the expense of the sanctioning country -- an entirely different beast than merely passive business between the sanctioned and a separate third-party.
>will undoubtedly cause a major international crisis.
It will, but it has less to do with any escalation by the US than it does with China's own, well, unique political environment. If a similar case occurred to CFO of e.g. Yandex, I have a hard time seeing Russians/Russia reacting nearly as strongly as I expect Chinese/China to.
> Since at least 2016, U.S. authorities have been reviewing Huawei’s alleged shipping of U.S.-origin products to Iran
Huawei is free to export all their Chinese origin products to Iran. The allegation here is that us-origin products are not following us export laws. This seems more like a case of "when in Rome, follow Roman laws".
[0] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-china-huawei/huawei-f...
You steal a car in Belgium. Belgium investigates, charges you and issues an arrest warrant. In some cases it goes to Interpol or EU-wide systems. You go to Germany for a vacation and your name is flagged. Yes, you are arrested by Germany for violating Belgian laws and the extradition process starts.
You can challenge the arrest on a few basis (such as "Iran wants to jail me for criticizing Mullahs") but other than that, countries do help each other catch criminals. "Violating US sanctions" is apparently a crime in USA and Canada more or less has the same view on major international relations so he is likely screwed. (I think the arrest is almost automatic everywhere, but then courts and justice dept decide on whether to extradite.)
I definitely feel anxious..
She works for the company in question.
This is supposed to be about Iran? Arresting the daugther of Huawei's founder definately makes it seem like there is more going on.
How is any significant American business man flying through Hong Kong airport supposed to feel right now?
They may be but US is on the right side of history on this one. And I say this as an European.
I hate Islamic Republic with every single cell in my body but you're just wrong.
* U.S. plain and simply fucked Iran up with a coup at 1953.
* Then helped Islamic Republic gain power in 1979. (This is up for debate though)
* Then helped Saddam Hussein attack Iran.
* Then sanctioned the country to the verge of bankruptcy.
* Then made a deal and backed out of it for no reason (Internal politics?)
As a European I wish the US would take all the refugees their actions cause.
The same kind of hardships that also radicalized Trump voters, it lead them to vote a populist fascist into power.
Of course if Iran or Iranians cause trouble in the future, you'd use these as an excuse to say "Trump did the right thing, see what they did, they deserved those sanctions!", ignoring cause and effect: without the sanctions, they wouldn't be that pissed off to cause these troubles.
This isn't Reddit, but the argumentative tone of this thread certainly reminds me of Reddit. Sensitive people make me sad :(
As anopther European, the US is most certainly on the wrong side of history with this shit. They're still salty that their pet dictator got ousted all those years ago.
2. Canada has similar embargo laws on the books.
3. Canada has a multi-lateral extradition treaty with the US
4. The crime is considered serious with a maximum penalty (in the US) of up to 20 years in prison plus substantial monetary fines.
So she's accused of a serious crime in the US that's also recognized as a crime in Canada, and the countries have an extradition treaty.
If I’m wholesaling Cisco routers and they show up in Syria or Iran, and Cisco and I can prove we didn’t know how they got there , that still doesn’t make it okay.
Canada arrested him, not the US.
If you mean, what is the authority for the US to ask Canada to do that, well, asking doesn't require any special authority; OTOH, the US does have an extradition treaty with Canada [0], and while trade sanctions violations don't appear to be an enumerated offense covered by the extradition treaty, sanctions violations tend to also involve false declarations and certain kinds of frauds, which are covered.
[0] https://www.oas.org/juridico/mla/en/traites/en_traites-ext-c...
What "authority" do you need to ask for a favor from a friendly ally? Canada also has active economic sanctions against Iran.
Please don't insinuate that someone hasn't read an article. "Did you even read the article? It mentions that" can be shortened to "The article mentions that."
I'm sure you forgot. We all make mistakes.
What if the us origin component was a plastic bezel, a screw or some peice of sheet metal in the chassis...
Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith.
You will also note that the poster of the question never came back to acknowledge the work people put into replying and explaining the situation. I believe that eduction wasn't the intent here.
The crackdown on online poker was a striking example of this. To give cliff notes the US, heavily influenced by casino lobbyists, decided to ban online poker. Online poker sites were operating in foreign countries obeying all laws domestically applied to them. In spite of the fact that sites were operating within all laws that domestically applied to them, the US decided to act because they refused to overtly ban US players. In an extremely rapid action the US simultaneously confiscated the domains of these sites, and executed arrest warrants on many of the involved individuals including surreptitious raids and extraditions from places including South/Central America, and froze numerous bank accounts around the world including in places such as Ireland.
The US is powerful enough that its own desire is sufficient authority to enact any action. Guantanamo Bay is a great example. This is not a just a US property under US law. It is operated as a US territory but mostly independent of US legal authority. The Geneva Convention is disregarded as convenient. For instance the three prisoners that were reported as having committed suicide (which would result in condemnation in Islamic belief) were allegedly tortured to death at a secret facility in Guantanamo, known as 'Camp No' (as in, no it does not exist), detached from the main camp. [1]
I'm not saying that Huawei is innocent, I just agree with the downvoted comment that the situation seems ridiculous.
Countries with "incompatible" legal systems generally don't have extradition treaties, but if they do you typically have to be charged with something that's a serious crime in both countries.
To the second aspect of your question, Canada is under treaty obligation to cooperate with extradition requests issued by US courts for fugitive apprehension, and Canadian courts will rule on whether the extradition is consistent with Canadian law before transferring the suspect to US federal custody.
Welcome to the rule of law.
What she is alleged to have done would be a crime in Canada too so her nationality isn’t relevant.
That's not a fair comparison. If any law was broken, it was definitely not broken on US soil. It would be like US arresting people that it thinks committed murders in China.
> What she is alleged to have done would be a crime in Canada too so her nationality isn’t relevant.
I think it is. It's also relevant where the crime occured. e.g., lets say some small country decides that it's illegal to wear grey color pants. Then, can they morally arrest any person anywhere in the world that they think wore grey color pants at any point in the time at any place in the world?
It seems the only allegations are against Huawei, of which sh is just one of many board members, and there's a good chance she wasn't even involved with the deal the allegation is concerning.
https://www.oas.org/juridico/mla/en/traites/en_traites-ext-c...
IE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smart_Border_Declaration
There's all sorts of similar agreements/declarations/etc. We have a rather fluid border for the arrest and extradition of individuals.
The US calling Canada on the phone and asking them to arrest someone they want seems too.. easy? I imagine there's a limit where goodwill only gets you so far, and then some sort of compensation is expected. Maybe there's a lot of backdoor Gov2Gov money funneling or economic deals, but idk. This seems like stuff that is opaque to average citizens.
> All extradition treaties currently in force require foreign requests for extradition to be submitted through diplomatic channels, usually from the country's embassy in Washington to the Department of State. Many treaties also require that requests for provisional arrest be submitted through diplomatic channels, although some permit provisional arrest requests to be sent directly to the Department of Justice. The Department of State reviews foreign extradition demands to identify any potential foreign policy problems and to ensure that there is a treaty in force between the United States and the country making the request, that the crime or crimes are extraditable offenses, and that the supporting documents are properly certified in accordance with 18 U.S.C. § 3190. If the request is in proper order, an attorney in the State Department's Office of the Legal Adviser prepares a certificate attesting to the existence of the treaty, etc., and forwards it with the original request to the Office of International Affairs.
For the Canadian version, see https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/cj-jp/emla-eej/tocan-aucan.htm...:
"""
There are three key stages to the Canadian extradition process:
The Minister of Justice must determine whether to authorize the commencement of extradition proceedings in the Canadian courts by issuing an “Authority to Proceed” ; Where an Authority to Proceed has been issued, the Canadian courts must determine whether there is sufficient evidence to justify the person’s committal for extradition; and Where the person is committed for extradition, the Minister of Justice must personally decide whether to order the person’s surrender to the foreign state. A person sought for extradition may appeal their committal and seek judicial review of the Minister’s surrender order.
In all cases, the conduct for which extradition is sought must be considered criminal in both the requesting country and in Canada. This is known as “dual criminality”.
Central Authorities from outside Canada are encouraged to contact the IAG to determine what is required to make an extradition request to Canada, including the evidentiary requirements, and whether provisional arrest is appropriate in a given situation.
"""
Some times the US later finds out that the arresting country’s courts found no authority or legality for their own country to arrest the person and wont continue with extradition. This happened in New Zealand.
So typically a bit more research is needed and they find a way to get it right in future cases.
Another thing the US does is send an FBI agent to merely observe the arrest, to ensure that it is later compatible with US courts as well. Its a lot of organizations to make happy but the US is essentially one of the only organizations with the resources and interest to bother.
It is an interesting outcome of the nation state concept.
Canada: 5'4 @110 lb kid in glasses with a pocket protector. Very smart. Has adoring crowd that claps.
US: the 6'1 220lb line backer built in the same school yard
Arrested Chinese exec: 4'10, 78lb daughter of a family from a different school somewhere over there. That school has lots of those like the US, US sometimes exchanges words with that school but they are somewhere over there.
Girls shows up in a schoolyard with Canada and the US. US tells Canada: "Give her to me. I have some business with her".
Basically, after that dinner in Argentina, one of them is dead, another is arrested.
I'm sorry to hear the loss of Prof. Zhang, however I suspect that his death may have had something to do with his heavy investment in some questionable blockchain startups.
Why do you suspect that?
I don't know about you, but these are not an accident, there are links in the Chain, the work of a single organisation, the Syndicate. A rogue nation trying to do destroy the system that created them, regardless who is in the way.
An Anti - IMF.
Ok small jokes only. But both pieces of news, the professor and CFO arrested are blocked in WeChat and Weibo so no one knew about it.
Stop it.
But I really wonder how many shocks this system can take. I would bet money that an important US executive for some company is arrested in the two years while visiting China.
EDIT:
There's another comment here asking how it's possibly legal for the US to do this. Whether you believe it or not, it's useful to know that the philosophy much of our state department believes in is called Realpolitik (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Realpolitik). It doesn't really matter what the law says or what treaties we've signed, the primary thing that matters for the US is what's pragmatic for it at the moment.
But yeah, if this is the game that the nations are going to play, then you don't want to be the poor schmuck sitting in a Chinese prison for 10 years just so they can make a point. It's probably time to start considering business models that allow you to operate at a distance from China. (Same with the smaller Chinese operators I guess? I mean, if I'm being fair. They should probably start considering models that don't require them to be in North America.)
If you're small, it's just a fact that this game is in danger of evolving beyond the capacity of your resources to play it.
Bottom line, whether you're Chinese or American, no one wants to start spending years on years in foreign prisons because they wanted to go to a foreign country to work for a few years. It's just not worth the risk.
Facilitating deals with Iran to deliver US products in defiance of US sanctions seems like something the average schmuck hopefully isn't getting mixed up in. It's not quite the same as accidentally violating some random domestic business laws.
Even in the US, there are over 20,000 laws and regulations at the federal level alone. In China, there are even more. Any small foreign operator in China naive enough to assert with 100% confidence that they are not in violation of any of those codes is being dangerously foolish.
So here's the thing, I actually agree with you. What China will do, they will do out of retaliation. However, I can pretty much guarantee that whoever the patsy is, that person will be in violation of some obscure code that no one in their right mind would have been paying attention to. They will definitely be in violation of some law. And they will condemn him/her to whatever ungodly prison camp for however many years.
So China will also be simply arresting someone for violating their laws. That's the issue.
Now my point is that if you are American, and a small operator without the clout to prevent this sort of thing from happening to you, it's best to try to get out in front of the problem. I know that I really don't want to be one of the poor stooges sitting in a Chinese prison for a decade because these people are trying to make tit-for-tat points.
I'm not talking politics or philosophy. I'm just saying that China is not like the US, and I'm advising people to be careful if they are small and plan to operate in what appears to be a dangerous legal environment that will likely be getting more treacherous with time.
This is one of the most interesting cases I've seen:
https://www.businessinsider.com/the-story-of-joseph-nacchio-...
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_involvement_in...
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d%27état
I've see US soldiers in the Middle East while I was there, generically they're just people but in a way theres something strange about a US military base in another country. I was born an expat during the Gulf War period and US is really seen as a big advanced petrodollar bully in the region and has really only brought even more death and chaos to Iraq than Saddam did ironically. Kofi Annan, past UN Secretary General, himself has said that the Iraq war was unjust but then again I'm just reminiscing about something the US and US citizens no longer cares about. Iraq is now just another failed state, and the deaths there don't matter.
It is absolutely crazy to think that US law should apply worldwide.
The article does not even mention if Wanzhou Meng is US citizen who broke US law in the US.
This case might be retaliation and fear mongering similar to the case of Julian Assange which is pure retaliation and fear mongering.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2017/03/1...
No other country could make a law like that and have any success in enforcing it abroad.
The United States is currently operating an illegal drone war in other parts of the world.
Imagine how you would feel if Russia was flying drones above the US and targeted bombing a certain extremist group of people. Are you sure the next wedding you attend none of your friends friends is a target (or a mistaken target)?
Imagine how you life would be when death can come from the sky at any moment and there is nothing you can do about it.
lol
Several Australian Mining and Casino executives and employees have been imprisoned for considerable time by China's opaque justice system.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-07-04/stern-hu-explainer-wh...
https://www.smh.com.au/business/crown-says-detained-staff-in...
Joseph Nacchio, the CEO of Qwest, was jailed for insider trading in 2001 and wasn't allowed to use his defence in court that it was retaliation for refusing NSA data requests.
Why are you so sure that this CFO did not break US trade law with regards to Iran?
Let's bring it to a trial, that would be the fair thing, and that's what is taking place.
For those who follow China closely, this delusion doesn't really exist. Check out this article from 2010:
https://www.chinalawblog.com/2010/05/how_not_to_get_kidnappe...
https://www.chinalawblog.com/2012/06/how-not-to-get-kidnappe...
A simple search on that (excellent) blog will give you many, many more examples. Those articles are years old; it's only getting worse.
But seriously, China is already preventing foreigners from leaving the country. https://www.afr.com/news/world/asia/china-steps-up-and-widen...
https://edition.cnn.com/2013/06/25/world/asia/china-us-busin...
Though there's a lot of realpolitik, it actually does matter what the laws say as well.
One that China is locking up thousands of Uyghur people for indefinite periods [1]
This one.
Well, I guess its closer to home when American businessman may face the same fate of being locked up in a Chinese prison.
It is annoying to read news like this. US is not a world's police. They should not be telling foreign citizens with whom they should or shouldn't trade.
Remarkable that they (she?) went through all the effort to set up a HK front company, but then left the Huawei logo on their powerpoint decks
Like Capote for tax fraud.
Extraditing someone to the US for violating US sanctions against Iran aligns pretty well with Canada's interests right now.
[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada%E2%80%93Iran_relations
Going off on a tangent, but the hypocrisy around the Middle East is so brazen, it's embarrassing. I am by no means a fan of the Iranian regime. It's as rotten as all the autocraticies and theocraties in the region. However, to claim Iran is irredeemable for supporting Assad while at the same time inking arm deals and strategizing with Saudi Arabia is an insult to our intelligence.
How was it proven false?
Think about it.
It's difficult to take housing issues in Vancouver seriously because paranoia nonsense like "all Chinese are money launderers" just wouldn't stop coming. As soon as a discussion happens, it gets swarmed by (dare I say it) bigots and immediately derailed.
If the whole company is suspected of breaking the embargo, why is just the CFO arrested? Was she just the one they could get?
Also, it seems weird that Huawei can sell their own products to Iran but not American products they own.
This seems likely. Any officer of the company might do in this circumstance. She might be the only one currently accessible in a country friendly to US extradition.
I'm guessing this is just a continuation of the trade war we've been having with china and we told the canadians to arrest the CFO to send a message to china. She was probably targeted because she was important enough to matter but not important enough to go to war over.
It'll be interesting how china responds. I doubt china would go after one of our execs but I wouldn't want to be a canadian executive in china.
If the basis of extradition is fraud by a corporate officer (which seems to be one of the more likely offenses in a trade sanctions case actually covered by the extradition treaty, as sanctions violations themselves are not), then the question is how many corporate officers of Huawei are in Canada and exposed to extradition?
I don't understand the last bit there about a "publicaton ban." So, in Canada, a suspect can request that some info of their arrest be withheld? I googled and came up with https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/cj-jp/victims-victimes/factshe..., but it doesn't make much sense to me since her name was published? So how would a publication ban protect her identity? I guess there could be others involved that she was protecting and not wanting the names released?
As stated on the wiki, likely because the publicity generated could affect the case. This case likely will get a lot of publicity.
Prior to the current return to Iran sanctions the USA had a monopoly on international payments clearance. The EU has responded by setting up an alternative system.
Again these are just hearsay at the mlment, however it does explain why the US/Canadian authorities were enboldened to act and she had to seek an order to prevent publication of the particilars of the case against her.
China wonders why we distrust their businesses, and this is the reason. They all seem to be heavily politically supported by the Chinese government.
We're all discussing it with the presumption that, of course, it would. When we indicted half of FIFA everyone in the EU loved us for it, and certainly no political establishments condemned it.
In 2013 she set up a Hong Kong shell company called Skycom Tech. That company (attempted to) purchase HP computers from the United States and resell them to Iran. The deal did not involve Huawei products, but many of the documents related to the deal were labeled "Huawei confidential" indicating they created the shell company to conceal their involvement.
She broke the law by attempting to do a straw purchase for the Iranian government of US manufactured restricted goods. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_purchase
Canada has an extradition agreement with the United States, so the Canadian government arrested her on behalf of the US.
Take Arms. Lets say the US has an arms embargo with a country like Iran. You would agree that it definitely is a violation (and it would be of many international treaties) to purchase US arms as a Hong Kong (replace with whatever country) firm and then resell them to Iran. Now, with computers being the next front of warfare, computer tech is treated similar to arms.
The whole movie 'War Dogs' is about people doing this with Soviet Arms, repackaging them, and selling them to the US. It was illegal, hence they got locked up at the end
EDIT: Above is the carrot. There are also sticks that can be brought to bear, like import tariffs.
What does that statement mean?
If the criminal is done by other colleagues in the company, should the executives be punished? I highly doubt the CFO is arranging the shipment to Iran...
Or simply because the CFO is the daughter of the founder?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Coat_Systems
It seems like the US Government has a serious axe to grind with Huawei.
"Canada has arrested the chief financial officer of China’s Huawei Technologies, who now faces extradition to the United States on suspicion she violated U.S. trade sanctions against Iran."
What violation was really committed? Was it Huawei doing business with Iran, like selling chips/devices/etc on their product line? If it (the Huawei company) did, shouldn't everyone on the company's employ who have had a hand on the products that were provided to Iran be arrested?
I look forward to having more factual information on this, rather than mere speculations on the violations that were supposedly committed.
The dictatorship of Iran is disgusting and dangerous but the US trades with countries governed by equally disgusting and dangerous dictatorships such as Saudi Arabia and China.
The US trade sanctions are imposed unilaterally and create mountains of troubles for US allies. Most of the world oppose the trade sanctions. Such sanctions rarely work anyways. It's a huge cost born not only by US companies but by companies in allied countries that have to obey US sanctions in order to avoid repercussions.
Combined with the UK's seizure of Facebook documents, it's a great week for assertive liberal democracies. Let's hope we're setting ourselves up for a 2019 where we'll get some sunlight into all the dark places that have been building up for the last couple of decades.
But someone on twitter is claiming the third party is not Huawei. [https://twitter.com/NicFildes/status/1070606845881008128]
https://www.yahoo.com/news/ex-interpol-chief-ousted-china-to...
Unilateral sanctions against Iran or Cuba without the consensus of the UN is questionable in law in the first place. What crimes have Iran or Cuba committed? And yet these sanctions without basis by countries who count Saudi Arabia as their closest ally are allowed to cause suffering to millions of people for decades on end and no one cares. This is the twisted state of our world.
It seems ultimately foolish to believe in ideals when they only apply to a certain group of countries in their benefit, and when not will use propaganda and their collective political and diplomatic power to harass others.
Huawei made an carefully worded announcement early this day and states that they are didn't violate any related law:
- https://www.zhihu.com/question/304821204
- https://weibo.com/2557129567/H5WbTkTkj
December 1, the same day Xi and Trump met at G20. Wonder if anything goes wrong.
Americans better find something this time, one Yinhe incident[0] is bad enough for PR already :)
That's how Julian Assange evaded arrest.
However, I don't think China was helping it's cause when a month ago it decided to arrest the Interpol chief, only to have that chief released a few hours latter.
Throw in that mix a crazy Putin itching for war in the Ukraine and we have three boys all trying very hard to take control the playground.
https://www.oas.org/juridico/mla/en/traites/en_traites-ext-c...
Just don't expect that anyone believes you anymore.
We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18616293 and marked it off-topic.
Surely, you realize the US earns its status on the global stage via its violent & powerful military, and the PetroDollar? It is foolish to suggest that the US expects other nations to possess any pretense of trust.
You don't have to believe me, because after all I'm just some dumb American. But you may want to take a good look in the mirror and ask yourself who is being the true "American" here.
Even if the next administration is deemed trustworthy what's with the one coming after that?
Yes
>Why choose to ignore the last 100+ years of the US's backstory
I was born in '93 so what happened 100 years ago isn't much of a concern for me.
>and focus on this rather minor setback to make such a bold statement?
Calling climate change a chinese hoax and exiting a global climate deal is not a minor setback.
Destroying the trust that Obama built over 8 years since Iraq and rolling back all his promises to the world, while having a 40%+ domestic approval rating, is not a minor setback.
>Surely, you realize the US earns its status on the global stage via its violent & powerful military, and the PetroDollar? It is foolish to suggest that the US expects other nations to possess any pretense of trust.
No I'm not aware that USA/EU common trade and foreign policy interested rest on us being afraid of the American armed forces, or on what currency is used to buy petrol.
>You don't have to believe me, because after all I'm just some dumb American. But you may want to take a good look in the mirror and ask yourself who is being the true "American"
What? Is this just a roundabout way of telling me I'm dumb?
Edit: verb tense.
https://books.google.com/books?id=grGMAwAAQBAJ&pg=PT221&lpg=...
The United Nations International Court of Justice, which ordered the US to withdraw sanctions, to which the US responded by pulling out of international agreements.
The European Union, which has attempted to block its companies from complying with US sanctions.
With that said, the US is free to sanction anyone for its own interests, that's its right as a sovereign state. It is also its right as a sovereign state to refuse market access and trade to any company that violates its sanctions.
But arresting foreign nationals in other countries for violating US sanctions? That's the equivalent of Russia arresting American business executives and extraditing them to China for violating Chinese sanctions against Taiwan - and yes, there are sanctions against Taiwan, which are regularly ignored by the US, of course. This is a massive escalation and will undoubtedly cause a major international crisis. Stay tuned.
Source:https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/a3hied/huawei_de...
The example I gave and what it looks like Meng did at Huawei are examples of the Chinese government actively supporting weapons programs in hostile regions. I very much feel that she should stand trial for the deception she did constructing these shell companies to sell US export controlled items to Iran.