Canada paying a price for overdependence on the U.S.
Celebrities and tycoons have all called Vancouver’s wealthy Shaughnessy neighborhood home. It’s also home to one of the most prominent symbols of the geopolitical standoff between East and West — Meng Wanzhou, deputy chair and chief financial officer of the Chinese telecom giant Huawei.
Meng was arrested by Canadian authorities in December, at the request of the U.S., while changing planes at Vancouver International Airport. The longtime Vancouver resident now spends her time here under strict bail conditions and under court-ordered surveillance while her Shaughnessy home undergoes renovations. Meng’s lawyers are fighting her possible extradition to America. Conspicuous black trucks occupy the street outside Meng’s home, and security guards at a booth that looks like a lemonade stand greet passersby at the end of the driveway.
Take about 30 steps from that driveway and you’ll reach American soil: residence of the U.S. consul general to Vancouver, complete with U.S. flag and Great Seal of the United States on the front gate.
Meng, the princess of China’s reigning 5G network, is wanted in the U.S. for allegedly violating sanctions with the sale of telecom equipment to Iran — sanctions that don’t exist in Canada. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau had expressed dismay over U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal — a withdrawal that led to the reimposition of U.S. sanctions against Iran.
This fiasco never should have been Canada’s problem. It’s not like there weren’t other options. The Canadian justice minister could have “filed” the U.S. extradition request at the bottom of a large pile of bureaucracy. Or some Mountie could have “oops-ed” Meng onto her connecting flight.
Instead, Canada jumped on the grenade, professing that Canada is a nation of laws. Yeah, U.S. laws, apparently — because it’s hard to see how Meng violated any Canadian laws.
And now China is attempting to put the screws to Canada over Meng’s predicament by detaining, or even retrying the court cases of, Canadian citizens in China. A Canadian man originally sentenced to 15 years in prison for trying to smuggle drugs out of China was recently retried and given a death sentence.
Trudeau’s leadership on this has put Canada in a lose-lose situation. If Meng wins her extradition case and heads back to China, Trump will probably flip out. If Meng loses her case and is sent to the U.S., China will be livid. Either way, it’s going to be a hard lesson for Canada about the necessity of an independent foreign policy that allows one to fly the middle finger when it’s in the country’s best interests.
It’s no secret why the U.S. is ratcheting up pressure against Huawei — the company is trying to dominate the global 5G telecommunications market at the expense of U.S. competitors. American allies have been bombarded with breathless warnings about the potential for Huawei to use its technology for spying.
Canada needs to stop playing politics and once again start acting like a sensible, fair-minded arbiter.
Citizens of both the U.S. and Canada are better off when the two countries serve as sounding boards for each other, particularly on matters of foreign policy, and when both operate from a position of strength. As Donald Trump’s relationships with other world leaders have proven, it’s really the only thing that the Negotiator in Chief in the White House respects.