Huawei issue: Canadian PM fires envoy to China
Mccallum appeared to side with daughter of Chinese firm’s founder
TORONTO: After having found himself mired in the most undiplomatic of controversies, Canada’s ambassador to China John Mccallum has been fired by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
“I asked for and accepted John Mccallum’s resignation as Canada’s ambassador to China,” Trudeau said in a statement, which did not expand on the dramatic reasons why Mccallum found himself in the news.
Canada and China are in the midst of a diplomatic standoff ever since the detention late last year of Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou in Vancouver for potential extradition to the US, and the apparently retaliatory measures undertaken by Beijing in arresting two Canadians, including a diplomat, and sentencing a third to death in a case related to drug smuggling.
As the crisis deepened, Mccallum aggravated the problem by holding a press conference in Toronto but only for ethnic Chinese media, in which he said Meng had a strong case against being extradited to the US and helpfully outlined the points of argument in her favour.
That performance earned Mccallum sharp criticism, as he seemed to be influencing the judicial process.
Mccallum later apologised. But at the end of last week, he told Starmetro Vancouver that it would be “great for Canada” if the US were to drop its extradition request against Meng, the daughter of Huawei Technologies Ltd founder Ren Zhengfei.
Trudeau initially defended Mccallum after the first episode, but as the envoy compounded that mistake, he was removed from his post.
Canada’s mission will now be led by Jim Nickel, the deputy head of mission at the embassy.