DOJ, Meng agree to deal for her to return to China
The U.S. Justice Department on Friday reached an agreement clearing the way for Huawei Technologies’ chief financial officer, Meng Wanzhou, to return to China in exchange for admitting some wrongdoing in a fraud case.
Meng, who has been detained in Canada since 2018, agreed to a deal in which federal prosecutors will defer and then ultimately drop the charges against her. The agreement was entered into the record during a hearing in federal court in the New York City borough of Brooklyn on Friday.
The case had become a symbol of the tumultuous relationship between two global superpowers, the United States and China, which is at its lowest level in decades. It also created a diplomatic challenge that has put Canada in the middle.
The deal will ease a large irritant in relations between the United States and China.
Canadian authorities arrested Meng, 49, the technology giant’s chief financial officer, in December 2018 at Vancouver International Airport in British Columbia, at the request of the United States. Meng, daughter of Huawei’s founder and CEO, Ren Zhengfei, instantly became one of the world’s most famous detainees.
In January 2019, the Justice Department indicted Meng and Huawei. It accused them of a decadelong effort to steal trade secrets, obstruct a criminal investigation and evade economic sanctions on Iran.
The charges underscored efforts by the Trump administration to directly link Huawei with the Chinese government after long suspecting that the company had worked to advance Beijing’s economic and political ambitions and undermine American interests.
Meng’s release could play into the fate of two Canadians imprisoned in China.
China detained former diplomat
Michael Kovrig and businessman Michael Spavor, soon after Meng’s arrest, in what has been widely viewed in Canada as hostage diplomacy. China has denied that the events were connected. In August, a court in northeastern China, where Spavor has lived, sentenced him to 11 years in prison after declaring him guilty of spying.
If the two men are released, it could provide a lift to Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who was reelected this week with a minority government after calling an unpopular snap election. Trudeau’s inability to secure their freedom has cast a shadow over his premiership.
As of Friday afternoon, Trudeau and members of his Cabinet had remained silent about the Meng deal.
Throughout her extradition hearing in Canada, Meng’s defense team professed her innocence. They argued that President Donald Trump had politicized her case and that her rights had been breached when she was arrested in Vancouver.
Judge Ann Donnelly said at the hearing that Meng had been charged with conspiracy to commit bank fraud, conspiracy to commit wire fraud and with wire fraud. Meng, who appeared by videoconference for Friday’s hearing, smiled and nodded in response.
Prosecutors said that under the deferred prosecution agreement, the Justice Department would withdraw its extradition request to Canadian authorities, clearing the way for her release provided that she adheres to the agreement’s terms. They said that the charges would be dropped Dec. 1, 2022.
Nicole Boeckmann, acting U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said in a statement that Meng had “taken responsibility” for her role in fraudulently deceiving a global financial institution into doing business with a Huawei subsidiary in Iran in violation of U.S. law.
She did not name the bank, but extradition proceedings against Meng in Vancouver identified HSBC as the main institution in question.
She said prosecutors would continue to pursue their case against Huawei.
In an interview, Michelle Lebin, a member of Meng’s legal team, said she was pleased that “Ms. Meng is free to go home and be with her family.”
While waiting for her case to begin, Meng was seen on a television screen in the Brooklyn court, sitting in her lawyer’s office in Vancouver, sipping tea, a large diamond ring glistening on her left hand.