Canadian court to deliver verdict on Meng’s case in August
A Canadian court will rule in August on the extradition case of Huawei’s chief financial officer Meng Wanzhou.
The Supreme Court of British Columbia will hold a hearing on June 29 and 30 to decide whether to accept the new evidence from Meng’s legal team, according to Global News.
The court confirmed that the final phase of the hearing in Meng’s extradition case is tentatively scheduled to begin on August 3, with a 1-week delay in the hearing if the court decides to accept the new evidence.
The final phase of the hearing is expected to last three weeks and will cover issues including whether Meng’s arrest was an abuse of process and whether the agencies concerned have remedied the abuse. At the same time, the court will also issue a final decision on whether to extradite Meng to the United States.
Previously, Meng’s legal team had made several applications to submit new evidence, including one for the court to accept an affidavit from a Huawei employee, claiming that it would prove that HSBC knew about the relationship between Huawei and Starcom and that Meng did not mislead the bank; and one for an affidavit from a Huawei accountant, claiming that it would provide a better understanding of Huawei’s financial practices and help prove Meng’s innocence. In both cases, however, Deputy Chief Justice Heather Holmes of the Supreme Court of British Columbia rejected the evidence as “not conducive to a credible outcome” and “not relevant” to the extradition hearing.
As previously reported in the media, the case could continue for years after the verdict if both sides continue to appeal.
Meng, 49, was arrested by Canadian police at the request of the U.S. government for mutual legal assistance as she passed through Vancouver International Airport in December 2018, after the U.S. government accused her of misleading HSBC by concealing Huawei’s relationship with its subsidiary Starcom Technologies Inc. and causing HSBC to violate the U.S. ban on Iran.
Subsequently, Canada-China relations deteriorated sharply when former Canadian diplomat Mingkai Kang and Canadian businessman Peifer were detained in China.
On March 19, as the U.S. and China met at a high level, a Communist Party court held the first trial of Spivey, who had been in custody for more than two years, and then reopened the trial of Kang Mingkai on March 22. Officials from 26 countries were present and concerned, but Chinese authorities banned all diplomatic officials from the courtroom, citing “national security considerations,” prompting condemnation from many countries.
The U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken tweeted on March 23 that the U.S. joined its allies in urging Beijing to immediately release Kang Mingkai and Spivey from arbitrary detention, stressing that “humans are not bargaining chips.”
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