The illusion of the rule of law, free world, globalization and the reality of control is simply frightening, and worrisome.
Rule of law has always been national. International politics are anarchic. Huawei quite clearly broke the laws of the United States (e.g. with respect to Iran), repeatedly and wilfully.
Huawei appears to have known this as well seeing as Meng Wanzhou had fraudently misrepresented the relevant transactions to the banks it was working with.
There was nothing extralegal about Meng Wanzhou's arrest.
You can start to see how far-reaching American sanctions are. A British bank is being told that it cannot do business with a Chinese company, because that Chinese company allegedly controls a Hong Kong company that imported small numbers of American goods into Iran. As I understand it, these sorts of extensive secondary sanctions are not normal, and are a sore point between the US and many countries, including some of its allies (such as France and Germany).
I would be very interested to know what gives the US any jurisdiction to demand the arrest of a foreign executive on foreign territory, for acts committed on foreign territory. Whatever the legal justification, though, this is a very unusual and aggressive step, and one that is transparently motivated by political considerations in the ongoing trade war.
She violated American laws with American products using U.S. dollars for years. She then travelled to an American ally.
This is a stupid counter argument.
Meanwhile, Société Générale, Deutsche Bank, BNP Paribas, JP Morgan have provably done exactly that.
Yet there is only one C-suite level executive who is currently being held personally, criminally liable for corporate actions. I guarantee you won't be seeing Jamie Dimon threatened with prison time for JP Morgan's 87 violations of Iranian sanctions and Weapons of Mass Destruction sanctions, anytime soon.
Laws which are enforced selectively lack credibility.
Your faith is US justice is admirable and patriotic. Do you believe Assange would also get a fair trial in USA ?
No. I don’t believe secret courts can be fair courts.
Meng, however, is being charged through normal channels by a prosecutor who must make a case in the regular court system. The charges and decisions will be made in the open. (There is a decent chance, due to the difficulty of admitting large swaths of evidence, that she could win.)
Was it proven in court or we should just believe everything US administration says?
Its fine if Huawei doesn't want to follow US law, but they shouldn't expect to do business with Americans or American companies either.
"If you do business in any way with any Americans at any point, regardless of who you are or where you're based, then you will be thrown in jail the moment we can get your hands on you, if you do business with anyone on this list, or with anyone who does not implement our rules either"
See how companies like ARM are being forced to stop doing business with Huawei despite not being American companies. It's massive overreach.
Are you saying that I can simply divert you mail because I think you broke my laws?
I suppose the only real difference was that this wasn't well-known in advance. It's like the Joker's statement about people losing their shit when something happens unannounced but being orderly when much worse is announced in advance.
And what consequences do you imagine there will be?
Previously, my little factory spent 100% of the budget for component x and component y on buying from American suppliers (quality and price are both very good).
But going forward, we plan to spend 70% to buy from Americans, 20% from other countries, and 10% to fund demestic research, and we will reduce the 70% part as soon as we can manage.
You can imagine if multiplying our small adjustment by the actions of hundreds of thousands of similar businesses around the world who are watching closely what's going on recently, then the interests of American businesses will probably be severely affected.
There has never been an absolute "rule of law". The rule of law is always protected and uphold by the government military. Otherwise, what to prevent your neighbour from killing you and taking your assets. There must be someone more powerful and armed than him.
The government uses the "power of law" idea to make people happy and mentally stable. But it'll use power when need be. The US bombed japan with nuclear weapons and will redo it again to protect its interests.
>The order, which will not name specific countries or companies, has been under consideration for more than a year but has repeatedly been delayed, the sources said, asking not to be named because the preparations remain confidential. It could be delayed again, they said.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-china-huawei-tech-exc...
Is it your position that Huawei is not a national security threat?
Huawei is probably a security threat but that isn’t new nor relevant. My position is that this is a transparent attempt to gain leverage at the negotiating table.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trade-china/trump-say...
But in one case the media will tell us about evil authoritarian regime that doesn't want to play by the rules, and in another case they present it as a "fair punishment" for "misdeeds".