Extradition from Canada to the USA: Why Meng's Chances of a Favourable Canadian Verdict Are Slim

Extradition by the numbers

This Extradition Fact Sheet from a Government of Canada website provides statistics on Canada-to-the-USA extradition cases over a ten year period from 2008 to 2018.  As you can see, once a  case is before a Canadian judge (as Meng's is now) only 8 times (total number of discharges/refusals in 10 years) of 798 US extradition requests has the court ruled in favour of the individual resisting extradition--roughly 1% of the time.

Fiscal YearTable note *	Total number of requests	Arrests	ATP’s Issued	Order of Committals	Total number of discharges/ refusals	Withdrawals	Total number of people surrendered
2008-2009	97	84	67	40	0	1	61
2009-2010	118	65	63	30	1	3	49
2010-2011	132	71	58	16	1	6	61
2011-2012	117	93	72	31	0	2	81
2012-2013	101	95	66	34	3	6	65
2013-2014	53	49	43	34	1	7	58
2014-2015	47	53	38	29	1	5	52
2015-2016	44	34	30	29	0	2	41
2016-2017	40	35	32	21	1	6	49
2017-2018	49	47	38	23	0	2	35
TOTAL	798	626	507	287	8	40	552

 A CBC News report on the "High Rate of Canadian Extraditions" described the need for reform.  As Robert Currie, a professor of law at Dalhousie University, described the Canadian system, "Once you are sought for extradition, your goose is pretty much cooked."

Best chance of avoiding extradition before Minister issues Authority to Proceed

In the same table above, when we compare the "number of requests" to "ATPs issued" (Authority to Proceed), we discover that in 65% of cases an Authority to Proceed was granted.  In other words for a person facing extradition, the best chance of avoiding extradition (35%) comes before an ATP has been issued.  Unfortunately for Meng, On March 1, 2019, the Department of Justice issued a press release announcing:

Today, Department of Justice Canada officials issued an Authority to Proceed, formally commencing an extradition process in the case of Ms. Meng Wanzhou. 

The decision follows a thorough and diligent review of the evidence in this case. The Department is satisfied that the requirements set out by the Extradition Act for the issuance of an Authority to Proceed have been met and there is sufficient evidence to be put before an extradition judge for decision.

 

Who issues Authority to Proceed?  Justice Canada officials or the Minister?

While this press release makes anonymous "Department of Justice Canada officials" responsible for the issue of an Authority to Proceed, elsewhere the Ministry website seems clear that "The Minister of Justice must determine whether to authorize the commencement of extradition proceedings in the Canadian courts by issuing an 'Authority to Proceed'."  In other words, from December 1, 2018 to March 1, 2019, the Minister of Justice, in consultation with the International Assistance Group of the Canadian Department of Justice, had the option not to issue an "Authority to Proceed" and release Meng from house arrest.

Who issues provisional arrest warrant?  A judge or the Minister?

On December 12, 2018, Jody Wilson-Raybould issued a statement saying:  “As the Minister of Justice, I take my extradition responsibilities and obligations very seriously." In that statement Wilson-Raybould claims:

Ms. Meng was arrested pursuant to a provisional arrest warrant issued by a judge of the Supreme Court of British Columbia a procedure which is contemplated in both the Extradition Act and the Treaty on Extradition between Canada and the United States in circumstances where urgency has been established. The decision to seek a provisional arrest warrant from the court is made by Department of Justice officials without any political interference or direction.

However, what the Extradition Act says is:

The Minister may, after receiving a request by an extradition partner for the provisional arrest of a person, authorize the Attorney General to apply for a provisional arrest warrant 

And consequently:

A judge may, on ex parte application of the Attorney General, issue a warrant for the provisional arrest of a person

How could Wilson-Raybould claim that "a provisional arrest warrant was issued by a judge" in accordance with the Extradition Act, when the Act specifies that she as Minister of Justice was responsible for issue of the warrant?  As explained on the Public Prosecution Service of Canada website:

Extradition treaties do not themselves create an obligation or a power to arrest in Canada. They merely define the basis on which provisional arrest may be requested. The judicial power to order provisional arrest arises under section 13 of the Extradition Act, once the Minister of Justice approves the request for provisional arrest (section 12).

How could Wilson-Raybould claim that the decision was made "without political interference or direction" when the Act and the Public Prosecution Service confirm that "the Minister of Justice approves the request"?

In Canada EXTRADITION IS POLITICAL

I must admit I have started yelling that in Canada EXTRADITION IS POLITICAL.  (By the way, kudos to David Akin for sharing my rebuttal to his ANALYSIS on his Twitter feed.  What better way to contradict my claim that journalists were censuring the discussion than to forward a link to my post.  As of today, I can report that the post has been viewed 71 times.)

I have gone looking for an answer to the question:  When the Extradition Act says "the Minister" does the text really mean anonymous "Officials of the Department of Justice"?  I have not found an answer that I can quote here, other than the glossary of definitions at the beginning of the Act which states: "Minister means the Minister of Justice."  What I have found are repeated confirmations that in Canada extradition is political.

Justice Minister David Lametti has already confirmed, in an interview with the Star that

foreign affairs will be a factor if and when it comes time for him to make what he acknowledges is a political decision whether to extradite Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou to the United States over China’s furious objections.

David Akin also confirms that

[ . . .] there will be an opportunity for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, through his justice minister, David Lametti, to intervene and, if they so choose, to block the extradition.But that opportunity comes much, much later, at the very end of the extradition proceeding.

 

The Shift from "it's not political" to "it's not political yet"

 The argument has shifted from "it's not political" to "it's not political yet." The problems with the new argument are numerous.  In the first place, someone should tell Minister of External Affairs, Chrystia Freeland, so she can stifle her strident claims that “When it comes to Ms Meng there has been no political interference ... and that is the right way for extradition requests to proceed.”

The second problem with the "let's do nothing now" approach, is that the extradition hearings in BC Supreme Court are not scheduled to start until January 2020.  The case will go on for at least two years, Canadians will languish in a Chinese prison, Canadian businesses and trade will suffer, and Canadian trade and relations with China may never fully recover.  As I commented at the beginning of the year: "if the naivety and Dudly-Do-Rightism of Canadian leadership allow the extradition hearings and detainment of Meng to continue for years, then the corporate objective of slowing down the competition will have been achieved--and the Government of Canada will have colluded in that corrupt undertaking."

The third problem with "let's wait" is that there is no legal, moral or practical reason to wait.  The Extradition Act states: "The Minister may at any time withdraw the authority to proceed and, if the Minister does so, the court shall discharge the person and set aside any order made respecting their judicial interim release or detention."  "At any time" includes right now.  If the Minister considers "all the relevant circumstances," as indicated in the law, the grounds for withdrawing the Authority to Proceed are numerous:  the original warrant is suspect, the request political, contrary to the Canadian Bill of Rights regarding nationality and ethnicity, no individual has been convicted of a crime in the USA for the behaviour of which Meng is accused (business in Iran), such behaviour is definitely not a crime in Canada, and, for obvious, practical reasons she will never be imprisoned in the USA as required by the Act and the Treaty on Extradition Between the Government of Canada and the Government of the United States of America.

The fourth problem with the passive, "wait and see," "let the judge decide" attitudes of our political leadership is they grossly overestimate the power of judges in extradition cases.  As the Supreme Court of Canada Judgement outlines in McVey versus the USA, "the role of the extradition judge is limited but important:  he or she must determine whether a prima facie case exists that the conduct of the fugitive constitutes an 'extradition crime' according to Canadian law."  In this "Judgement," the Justices make the point 15 separate times that the extradition judge has "limited" functions and "modest" powers.

The solution is political, but Canadian politicians play Pontius Pilat

The point here is that unlike the Minister of Justice who is tasked with considering "all the circumstances," the extradition judge is only tasked with considering whether or not what Meng has done looks, at first glance, like bank fraud--the extraditable offense of which she is accused.  However, the Supreme Court Justices have indicated that the extradition judge cannot investigate or consider American law.  Can she,  for example, consider the fact that no individual has ever been convicted of a crime in the USA for transgressing the Iran sanctions?  It appears not.  This responsibility falls to the Minister of Justice.  The historical statistics indicate that Meng has a 99% chance of being extradited.  This is so because of the limitations of an extradition hearing and limited powers of an extradition judge, and the reluctance of the Minister of Justice to act at the end of extradition hearings.

Supreme Court of Canada confirms Minister, not a judge, has the power 

The Supreme Court Justices make the point repeatedly that the extradition judge's powers are limited, but the Minister of Justice's powers are broad:

When a request is made, the political authorities in the requested state will examine the material to see that the request complies with these terms and conditions.  The treaties also make provision for the requesting state to supply certain material whereby the requested state can determine the validity of the request and its compliance with the terms and conditions of the treaty (see Art. 9 of the treaty here (Can. T.S. 1976 No. 3)), and it is reasonable that these are the materials to be looked at in determining the issue.  In essence, the treaty obligations are of a political character to be dealt with in the absence of statute by the political authorities.

          [ . . . .]

Nowhere is the duty to consider the foreign law assigned to the extradition judge.  This, as I mentioned, is a task for the political authorities at common law, now assigned by statute to the Minister of Justice.

          [ . . . .]

In Canada, the procedure, we saw, is more fluid, the case frequently coming before the extradition judge before the formal requisition has been made.  But the substance is the same; the Minister of Justice may at any time refuse to surrender and discharge the fugitive (s. 22 of the Act).

           [ . . . .]

the Extradition Act, which we saw only requires that there be prima facie evidence of an act that constitutes a crime listed in the treaty according to the law of Canada.  In fact, the Act does not deal with proof of foreign law at all.  That, as I said, is a matter for the executive.  (The executive, in Canada, means political representatives of the Queen, in particular the Prime Minister. See https://www.lawnow.org/democratic-governance-the-constitution-and-canadas-branches-of-government/).

           [ . . . .]

[ . . .] what is really important is that a person should not be surrendered to another country for conduct that is not considered a serious crime in the requested country.  

Canada and Canadians are facing a serious situation which requires political action.  We have to stop letting our politicians off the hook with delaying, "it's not political" arguments and require them to perform the duties for which they were elected.

When It Comes to China, Do Canadians Believe the Media?

The Media blitz

Since I first published a post ( 10 Dec 2018) on Canada's arrest of the Huawei CFO, Meng Wanzhou, I have been baffled, awestruck and frustrated by the refusal of Canadian media to question the legitimacy of her arrest and extradition.  Since I began the process of my own modest online inquiries, I have noticed that the National Post, the newspaper founded by Conrad Black before he went to prison (he has since been pardoned by President Trump), has published some of the most strident anti-China editorials.  Although, Black sold the paper to one-time Liberal Izzy Asper, in recent years "the Post has retained a conservative editorial stance."

What does "freedom of the press" mean?

Obviously every newspaper in the "free" world is owned by somebody. Does it matter who owns a newspaper or a media company?  I don't know.  I've never worked for a newspaper.  I'm not particularly courageous or selfless, so I imagine that if I worked for a large media company I would be reluctant to risk my job, my salary, my social position and connections by publishing anything that I knew ran seriously counter to the interests and ideology of my top-of-the-pyramid employer.  I find it discouraging that Robert Maxwell "who embezzled hundreds of millions of pounds from his companies' pension funds" also controlled hundreds of newspapers. (His daughter, Ghislaine Maxwell,  is in the news with claims that she was sexual predator Jeffrey Epstein's madame, supplying him with juvenile prostitutes.) It is hardly encouraging that Robert Maxwell's nemesis, media mogul Rupert Murdoch, "faced allegations that his companies, including the News of the World, owned by News Corporation, had been regularly hacking the phones of celebrities, royalty, and public citizens. Murdoch faced police and government investigations into bribery and corruption by the British government and FBI investigations in the U.S."

Does it matter that the Globe and Mail is wholly owned by The Woodbridge Company which is the private holding company of the Thomson family?

Is Reuters covering the story, or is Reuters the story?

As your typical diffident Canadian, I have long been aware but not terribly disturbed by the fact that our news comes to us through channels that usually have owners.  As a Canadian, I think that we have CBC News and are therefore immune from tampering.  However, this seemingly innocuous article disturbed me: "New documents link Huawei to suspected front companies in Iran, Syria."

Why is it disturbing? If you followed the link, you will realize that it is presented under the banner CBC News.  However, this is not by any stretch of imagination CBC News.  As the small print and the content of the article make clear this is a publication of Thomson Reuters, the news agency owned by The Woodbridge Company of which the Thomson family are the principal shareholders.  Reuters is categorical that "Our correspondents do not use unconfirmed reports as the basis of a story, nor do they offer subjective opinion."  Nonetheless, readers need to be alert to the fact that what appears to be the research and writing of journalists from our national public broadcaster is, in fact, the work of un-named authors working for a private company principally owned by a single family.

Reading the article you will quickly discover that Reuters isn't just reporting the story, they are the story.

 . . . corporate filings and other documents found by Reuters in Iran and Syria show that Huawei, the world's largest supplier of telecommunications network equipment, is more closely linked to both firms than previously known.

Reuters have actively been building a case which might ultimately be used against Meng.  As they report, somewhat proudly:

Articles published by Reuters in 2012 and in 2013 here about Huawei, Skycom and Meng figure prominently in the U.S. case against her. 

Does Thomson Reuters have skin in the Meng-Huawei game?

Under "normal" circumstances, we would praise journalists for the hard slogging, investigative journalism required to unearth evidence.  However, in this case, we don't know who the authors are.  We are encouraged to believe that this "news" comes from the CBC, but obviously no CBC journalists were involved.

Does Thomson Reuters have any skin in this game?  Is it reasonable to ask this question?  I ask the question quite naively, but the result is surprising.  Thomson Reuters has gone through significant restructuring this year.  (I own 16 shares of Thomson Reuters stock by the way.) In its Annual Report for 2018, Thomson Reuters announced "In October, we sold 55% of our Financial & Risk (F&R) business to private equity funds managed by Blackstone for approximately $17 billion and retained a 45% interest in the new company, which is now known as Refinitiv."

Refinitiv, as its website displays, is collaborating on China's "Belt and Road Initiative" (aka "The New Silk Road") which the company describes as "The Infrastructure Project of the Century."  Thomson Reuters is now invested in China.  Will we begin to see a softening of positions and warming toward China in the Globe and Mail and Reuters' reports?  On November 4, Reuters still appeared to be maintaining a negative slant on China, but on November 5, along with everyone else, they reported on the front page of the Globe and Mail print edition that China had lifted its ban on Canadian beef and pork.

[This link (above) is to the "Global News" website.  Since I'm on the theme, I checked to see "who owns Global News?"  It's owned by Corus, which is controlled by the Shaw family.  Wherever you get your news in Canada, there is likely to be a family at the top of the pyramid.]

Same numbers different story

Reuters published this article 4 Nov 2019:  "Less than a third of Canadians view China favorably -poll."  Considering the media coverage, I think the real and surprising news is that 29% of Canadians continue to view China favourably. Reading this "Less than a third" headline, I was reminded of living in Quebec during the referendum years.  I can vividly recall standing at the counter of my local depanneur (corner store).  Glancing down to my right, I saw the bold, front-page headline of the Montreal Gazette: "One Third of Anglos Determined to Leave an Independent Quebec."  Looking to my left, the front-page headline of the French-language La Presse read "Two Thirds of Anglos Happy to Remain in an Independent Quebec"  [my translation from memory]. Same numbers different stories.

Summarizing a UBC survey, Reuters reported:

“The chill is real,” concluded the survey. China is now viewed favorably by 29% of Canadians, down from 36% two years ago but up from 22% in February, it concluded.

 

"Canadian Public Attitudes on China and Canada-China Relations"

"The chill is real" is a direct quotation from the UBC report, but the sentence appears on page 2, and is not a conclusion to the report as a whole.  "The chill" refers only to the drop of 7% from the previous survey two years ago.  Oddly, survey numbers indicate that attitudes toward China have warmed by 7% since February.  In the face of a Canadian media blitz condemning China for the arrest of two Canadians, and numerous reports on the threat China poses to Canada, it is astounding that one third of Canadians continue to view China positively.  (Keep in mind, that one third is almost as many Canadians as voted for the re-elected Liberal Party in the recent election.)

Survey says . . . 

The results are even more surprising, given the tenor of the survey as a whole which includes questions about human rights in China, references to Canadians Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor, and a substantial listing of all the reasons a Canadian might perceive China negatively.  A frankly amazing statistic (again given media coverage) is presented in the conclusion of the report:

A plurality (39%) of respondents felt arresting Meng was a mistake, and a plurality (35%) feel she should be released before judicial proceedings complete.

Consider:  if "arresting Meng was a mistake" were a political party, it would have formed a majority government in the October 2019 election.  Despite our politicians and our journalists, Canadians are impressive.  Being "wary of China while supporting continuing contact" and releasing Meng--all make perfect sense.

Is Canada’s Print Media Fair on China

Influential, misinformed Canadian media hurts China-Canada relations: envoy

Canada-China Relations: A Note on Public Attitudes

When Chrystia Freeland Said that the Extradition of Huawei CFO, Sabrina Meng Wanzhou, Was Strictly a Judicial Affair, Was She Lying? Or Just Avoiding the Truth?

Generally, I have been a Freeland admirer (see Saint Mathew Pray for Us).  I sympathized as she stood beside Mike Pompeo at a Washington press conference and had to come up with six different ways of saying that the arrest, detention and possible extradition of Huawei CFO, Sabrina Meng Wanzhou, was strictly a judicial affair--and in a "rule of law" country like Canada, the process was immune from political interference.

I believed her. I had already read the same claim in half a dozen news reports.  I repeated the claim myself. When a claim gets repeated that often, it's hard to resist the idea that it must be true.  Then, I had a look at the Canadian Extradition Act.  Here is what the Extradition Act actually says:

Withdrawal of the authority to proceed 

(3) The Minister may at any time withdraw the authority to proceed and, if the Minister does so, the court shall discharge the person and set aside any order made respecting their judicial interim release or detention.

"The Minister" in this instance is the Minister of Justice: Jody Wilson-Raybould.  Far from restricting elected officials from interfering in the case, the Act specifically empowers the Minister of Justice to refuse the extradition:

Reasons for Refusal

Marginal note:When order not to be made 

44 (1) The Minister shall refuse to make a surrender order if the Minister is satisfied that 

(a) the surrender would be unjust or oppressive having regard to all the relevant circumstances; or

 (b) the request for extradition is made for the purpose of prosecuting or punishing the person by reason of their race, religion, nationality, ethnic origin, language, colour, political opinion, sex, sexual orientation, age, mental or physical disability or status or that the person’s position may be prejudiced for any of those reasons.Marginal note:

The Act clearly and repeatedly specifies that the Minister has the power and even the obligation to take action.  She has the power to consider "all the relevant circumstances" and "may at any time withdraw" the judiciary's authority to proceed with the extradition.  She has the power to set aside the order for Meng's detention.  Perhaps it's time for our political leadership to end the pretence of powerlessness and begin acting as if Canada were a sovereign nation.  Let's stop acting like a branch plant of corporate America.  Let's resolve this messy situation in the best interests of Canada and Canadians before it gets even worse.

Addendum

On January 14, 2019, (11 days after I first published this post), Jody Wilson-Raybould was replaced as Minister of Justice by Dave Lametti.

https://www.billboard.com/articles/business/8493858/appointment-canada-new-minister-justice-copyright-reform-concerns

Addendum 2

On Feb. 7, 2019, after 9 weeks of denial from the PM and the Minister of External Affairs , the new Justice Minister, David Lametti, finally admitted that the extradition of Sabrina Meng Wanzhou is "political."  https://www.thestar.com/politics/federal/2019/02/07/decision-whether-to-extradite-huaweis-meng-wanzhou-will-ultimately-take-political-factors-into-account-new-justice-minister.html

However, this admission has passed virtually without comment in the Canadian media.

The Panda and the Beaver

The Difference between pandas and beavers

The panda and the beaver are very different animals.  The panda is big and black and white, eats bamboo and likes to sleep in the top of trees.  The beaver is small and brown, eats maple trees and lives inside a beaver damn.  Beavers and pandas don't have much to do with each other, except that eating maple trees is good for bamboo, and eating bamboo helps the growth of maple trees, so they got along.  Then one day the eagle told the beaver, those pandas have been helping the leopards, so you should grab that panda cub when she comes near your pond.  Beavers always do what the eagle tells them to, so they did.  They grabbed the panda cub and brought her underwater to their lodge.  The beavers treated the panda cub very nicely because beavers are nice.  When the pandas saw what the beavers had done they were very upset and they grabbed two beavers and brought them to the top of the trees.  Beavers don't like being high in the air--pandas aren't nice like beavers.  Then the pandas began to drain the water out of the beaver pond--pandas really aren't nice like beavers.

The Beaver response

When they saw what was happening the beavers did what beavers do, they slapped their tails against the water to make a loud noise.  When the eagle heard the noise he understood and said: "Yes, what the pandas are doing isn't nice!"  The beaver slapped its tail some more and the rooster and the lion and the kite and the falcon and camel all agreed that "the pandas weren't nice like the beavers."  And the beavers all agreed "we're nice, but the pandas aren't."  But the bear and the crocodile and the cobra and the leopard and lots of other animals still seemed to like the pandas.  So the beavers told themselves some more, "Pandas aren't nice like beavers."  But the two beavers stayed in the trees and the pandas continued to drain the pond.

Is the panda a dragon?  What kind of dragon?

Enough Aesop's already--except to quote a line from a documentary on China and the New Silk Road:  "China is a friendly dragon, but it's still a dragon."  Canada's relationship with China, its second-largest trading partner, is the most acute and urgent problem facing legislators, but I heard no substantive discussion of the issue during the recent election campaigns.  Only one politician, Yves-François Blanchet, leader of the Bloc Québécois dared to mention China in the leaders' debate.  Blanchet proclaimed that it was foolish of Canada to arrest the Huawei CFO, trying to flex muscles that it did not have before China. In his report on the debate, Paul Welles, in keeping with what has become the Anglo-Canadian journalistic meme, took the opportunity to play to Anglo-Canadian self-righteousness mixed with a bit of Quebec bashing, while alluding to how law-abiding we have been been in arresting Meng.

He [Blanchet] did say arresting Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou “may have been a big mistake,” which I will take as his way of letting everyone know that a sovereign Quebec would ignore its obligations under extradition treaties. 

Had Welles taking 45 minutes to consult the Canadian Extradition Act, or the  Treaty on Extradition Between the Government of Canada and the Government of the United States of America, or even the Public Prosecutor Service of Canada's clear instruction that "Extradition treaties do not themselves create an obligation or a power to arrest in Canada," he might have reconsidered his mockery of Blanchet.  However, these days the job of most Canadian journalists is to repeat not to research.

China's new "Silk Road" 

For most of its history, Canada's economy has depended on trade with the USA to function and survive.  However, China has been challenging the USA as the world's largest and most powerful economy.  As the USA has adopted a fuck-you-if-you're-not-American economic policy, China has been subsidizing massive infrastructure projects all over the world--hundreds of billions spent in 65 different countries so far.   The size and scope of Chinese global subsidies have been compared to the USA's Marshall Plan after the Second World War.

How should Canada behave in this battle of Titans?

A number of editorials and Jonathan Manthorpe's recent monograph, Claws of the Panda:  Beijing's Campaign of Influence and Intimidation in Canada emphasize that we should mistrust and fear the current Chinese regime.

Okay.  Once fear and mistrust have been established, then what?  Manthrope judiciously points out that "engagement with China cannot and should not be avoided" and claims that his book is not "arguing that Canada should distance itself from the current regime in Beijing."  However, since his premise is that representatives of Chinese diplomacy or business can be viewed as "spies" for a "fascist" regime in Beijing, a thick cloud of suspicion is cast over virtually every interaction between Canada and China.

Here's the smoke, where's the fire?

In these cautionings about Canada becoming too cozy with China, concrete examples and hard evidence never quite match the level of the sensational rhetoric and headlines.  The essayists'  evidence is often in the form of guarded references and allusions to CSIS (the Canadian Security and Intelligence Service).  CSIS itself is part of the problem.  Our Intelligence Service has yet to gain the recognition of the population or the confidence of our political class.  (This is, after all, the organization that Arthur Porter, who was convicted of receiving $22 million in bribes from SNC-Lavalin, was tasked with overseeing.)  Evidence, purportedly coming from CSIS, of Chinese malfeasance, is in the form of leaks and anonymous sources--all under the required veil of secrecy.  When there are supporting public documents such as the  National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians Annual Report 2018, they don't quite live up to the dire, definitive headline:  "It's official – China is a threat to Canada's national security."  Or, as in the case of Rethinking Security: China and the Age of Strategic Rivalry, linked on the CSIS website, we are informed that what we are reading is not a CSIS report but the opinions of un-named academics. Ultimately, when Manthorpe offers potential solutions, they sound much more like the status quo, a (re)new(ed) cold war, or simply too abstract to be meaningful:

. . .  future governments in Ottawa need to prepare the ground. They need to cement political, economic, social, and security ties within NATO and the G7, along with other like-minded countries. Canadian politicians need to assume a much tougher and more self-assured attitude toward Beijing than is now the case.

If these are the solutions, can the threat to Canada be that dramatic?

The Examples of Australia and New Zealand

Warnings of the Chinese threat in Canada typically cite the examples of New Zealand and Australia.  In fact, when the argument is being presented that China is a threat to Canadian sovereignty the authors most frequently quoted are from Australia and New Zealand--Clive Hamilton and Anne-Marie Brady respectively. (See, for example,"Academic who blew the whistle on China's influence on Australia says Canada is in even worse trouble, [take note of the quite innocent but dire looking photo] and  "How China uses shadowy United Front as 'magic weapon' to try to extend its influence in Canada."  Both articles published in the National Post.)

I agree with Manthorpe that the Australians have been a "good deal louder" than we have in discussing their relations with China.  Watching the Australian television series Pine Gap, I was struck by how the challenge of being in the middle of a China-versus-USA conflict is forefront in the Australian imagination.   Fiction aside, Pine Gap is, in reality, a "US satellite surveillance base" run jointly by Australia and the USA.  "The station is partly run by the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), US National Security Agency (NSA), and US National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) and is a key contributor to the NSA's global interception effort, which included the ECHELON program."  If you watch the tv series to the end, you will discover that these fictional Australians are much more concerned by the recklessness of the American regime than by the financial investments of a Chinese businessman in their communities.

There is more to fear than fear itself

It makes perfect sense to be wary of Chinese investments and influence in Canada, particularly as China is expanding its global empire and, in some instances, using debt-trap diplomacy to achieve its objectives.  There is no doubt that the current regime in China espouses and promulgates a system of values which runs counter to the dominant values of the West.  General Secretary Xi Jinping's Document 9 on the Current State of the Ideological Sphere clearly and explicitly spells out those differences.  We need to have an open, public discussion of Canada's relationships with China.  Describing those relationships as "a war" and couching the discussion in terms of espionage do not strike me as helpful.  At the moment we seem to have fear-mongering in one corner and naivety in the other, but willful ignorance about everything in between.  The absolute refusal of Canadian politicians and media to discuss all aspects of the Meng arrest is evidence of our current inability to have an open discussion.

"Open discussion" is NOT the same singular argument presented over and over

Global News published a commentary this morning in which it is observed that "Meng is living in a gilded cage at one of her two multi-million dollar homes in Vancouver and is free to go shopping and eat out."  How many times do we need to hear this beside-the-point inanity before someone finally asks, "Were we justified in arresting her in the first place?"

Jonathan Manthorpe was invited to discuss his book on TVO's The Agenda.  The episode, Exposing China's Influence in Canada, was bookended by references to Canada's arrest of Meng.  Both the introduction to the show and Manthorpe's penultimate answer referred to the arrest of the Huawei CFO. However, in discussing the "Huawei affair,"  Manthorpe described it as "the kidnapping and holding hostage of two Canadians."  Not a single word was spoken about the Meng arrest which precipitated this reprehensible response.  I certainly agree with Manthorpe that in our dealings with China we have to ask "How does this benefit Canada?"   How has arresting Meng benefited Canada?

Back to Aesop

The panda princess is still being held in a "luxurious" beaver lodge, beavers are still being held in the trees and the pandas continue to drain the pond.  How is the newly-re-elected leader of the beavers going to deal with the situation?  He's going to make it rain!

Comparing "Remediation Agreements" and the Canadian Extradition Act, or Did the Liberal Obsession with SNC-Lavalin Prevent Jody Wilson-Raybould from Dealing with the Meng Extradition?

Asking you to compare the amendments to the Criminal Code entitled "Remediation Agreements" with the Canadian Extradition Act is probably way too nerdy a request.  Nonetheless, if you are as nerdily inclined as I am, and you have given up on getting any factual information through the Canadian media, as I have, you now have links to both documents online.

The first thing you will notice if you browse these documents (okay, I'm guessing you won't) is that the "Remediation Agreements" legislation, even though it is an amendment to the Criminal Code was passed as part a Budget Implementation Act (Bill C-17) under the purview of the Department of Finance.  In her explosive testimony to the Justice Committee yesterday, Jody Wilson-Raybould was goaded a number of times into saying she didn't like Remediation Agreements.  She wisely and judiciously declined to comment, but we can imagine she accepted but was not thrilled by this legislation which was clearly designed by the Liberal Government to get SNC-Lavalin off the hook.  Listening to her testifying yesterday, it became apparent to me that rewriting the criminal code to accommodate one particularly powerful company was not how Jody Wilson-Raybould thought the law should operate.

It is an understatement that we will hear ad infinitum in the days ahead that there was a failure of communication between the Prime Minister's Office and the Ministry of Justice, but the ultimate take-away is that Justin Trudeau was out of his depth dealing with the SNC-Lavalin case and out of his depth dealing with Jody Wilson-Raybould.   The fact that so many of his underlings and a civil servant like Michael Wernick took it upon themselves to pressure the Ministry of Justice tells me they felt Trudeau couldn't do what needed to be done and he, in turn, naively thought if the pressure was applied by his minions, he could maintain what President John Kennedy once infamously called "plausible deniability."

The absurdity of the situation is that it appears that no-one in the PMO actually read the Remediations Agreement act which they had passed.   If you compare the Extradition Act and Remediations Agreement legislation, you will notice that the Minister of Justice and Attorney General (they are one person) is mentioned repeatedly (more than 100 times) in the Extradition Act.  The Minister is called upon to act and guided as how to act in extradition cases.  In contrast, the Remediations Agreement regime mentions the Attorney General exactly twice:

The "remediation agreement" requires the AG's consent.  The process can only proceed if "the Attorney General has consented to the negotiation of the agreement."  Once the agreement is in place, profits from the company's crimes are "to be disposed of as the Attorney General directs."

The law is framed in such a way as to assume that everyone will go along with a remediation agreement.  No consideration was given to the idea that a prosecutor might refuse to use the Remediation Agreement legislation.  There is no provision in the legislation for the AG to recommend, advise, council or in any way interfere with the prosecutor's decision if the prosecutor chose a criminal trail over remediation.  The PMO, the Finance Minister and the Clerk of the Privy Council weren't just asking Jody Wilson-Raybould to use the influence of her office, they were asking her to break the laws which they themselves had written.

While the "powers that be" seemed to have forgotten that they gave Jody Wilson-Raybould no power over remediation agreements (other than to approve them), they did continue to hound her to do what she had no power to do: impose a remediation agreement.  No doubt as a crumb of respect, since the legislation apparently came from Finance and not Justice, the legislation twice mentions the Minister of Justice, giving her the power to make "recommendations" on future changes to the legislation.

At yesterdays's hearing, the NDP Member of the Justice Committee, Nathan Cullen, spoke of "the incredible hypocrisy" of the Trudeau Liberals talking of "judicial independence from political influence in the Huawei CFO extradition case" at the same time they were actively interfering in the SNC-Lavalin criminal case.  Cullen's point is well taken, but it is also important to understand the difference in the two legislations.  Unlike the Remediation Agreement legislation, the Extradition Act  specifically gives the Minister of Justice the power to act and gives multiple grounds on which she must act (see A Dozen Reasons to Release Meng).

Listening to Jody Wilson-Raybould's testimony yesterday, and realizing for the first time that she is an astute lawyer with an impressive command of the facts and the law, I was more surprised than ever that she had not dealt with the Meng extradition case.  Could the chaos of the SNC-Lavalin case have undermined what needed to be done when Richard Donoghue, the US Attorney, requested Meng's arrest?  Was Jody Wilson-Raybould left out of the loop when Justin Trudeau was informed three days in advance of the Meng arrest because Trudeau was already gun shy from having pressured Wilson-Raybould over SNC-Lavalin?  Was Wilson-Raybould hamstrung from dealing with the Meng extradition because she was on her way out as Minister of Justice?  Six weeks after the Meng arrest and two weeks before the Americans presented the indictment against Huawei Wilson-Raybould was demoted out of Justice.

Last night's and today's press conferences make it clear that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's new mantra is "jobs, jobs, jobs" to excuse political interference in the SNC-Lavalin case.  However, our trade relations with China and the future of Huawei in Canada will also affect "jobs, jobs, jobs," not to mention technological advancement in Canada and the fact that two Canadians remain in a Chinese prison and a third is facing the death penalty.  The law, the Canadian Extradition Act, allowed him to solve the problem in concert with the Minister of Justice, but it appears that his mind was elsewhere.

Despite all the brouhaha, all the smoke, we should ask the question at the centre of the Liberal Government-SNC-Lavalin scandal.  Why didn't the prosecutor use the Remediation Agreement legislation with SNC-Lavalin?  In light of everything that has been said and is being said about the case, this paragraph from the Remediation Agreement legislation took my breath away.

Factors not to consider
(3) Despite paragraph (2)‍(i), if the organization is alleged to have committed an offence under section 3 or 4 of the Corruption of Foreign Public Officials Act, the prosecutor must not consider the national economic interest, the potential effect on relations with a state other than Canada or the identity of the organization or individual involved. 

The Corruption of Foreign Public Officials Act is Canadian legislation which says that it is a crime in Canada if a company paid bribes to public officials in another country.  This is exactly what SNC-Lavalin is accused of doing:  paying bribes in Libya from 2001 to 2012.    The law specifically instructs the prosecutor that she must not consider "national economic interest" in deciding whether or not to offer SNC-Lavalin a Remediation Agreement.  Obviously this is what the prosecutor has done.  She has followed the law and not taken into consideration the effects on the national economy--job losses, decline in stock prices and the risk of SNC-Lavalin moving their head office--in making her decision.  Ironically, or maybe it is just plain absurdity, the PMO and Department of Finance were pressuring the Minister of Justice to, in turn, pressure the prosecutor, to make a deal with SNC-Lavalin, using exactly the argument--"national economic interest"--which they specified in the legislation they themselves drafted should not be considered.

Absurdity will be piled upon absurdity in the days ahead, as the Liberals will have to argue that a remediation deal with SNC-Lavalin was in "the national economic interest"--exactly what they said should not be considered when they drafted the legislation in the first place.  Will any paid, professional journalist in Canada have a look at the Remediation Agreement legislation and point out this contradiction?   Hmmmm  . . . . probably not.

Addendum

A good friend just (3 March 2019) brought to my attention an article in the Globe and Mail (21 February 2019) by Robert Fife and Steven Chase ("Wilson-Raybould told cabinet SNC-Lavalin pressure was inappropriate") in which they note that "Under Canada’s new deferred-prosecution agreement law, prosecutors are not allowed to consider national economic interests when deciding whether to settle with a company."  I must humbly acknowledge that this is exactly the legal fact that I was trying to goad the mainstream media into promulgating.

The article also mentions that "Mr. Trudeau has acknowledged he raised concerns about the economic impact that a conviction could have on SNC-Lavalin when he met privately with the then-justice minister and attorney-general on Sept. 17 [ . . . .]" and additionally, "time and time again in Question Period he said anything he did was in the service of sustaining jobs in Canada."  Much as I congratulate Fife and Chase for mentioning the law in this article; rhetorically speaking, they did very little to highlight and draw attention to the fact that what the Liberal Prime Minister has admitted doing and done publicly in the House of Commons was in direct contradiction to the legislation on Remediation Agreements which the Liberal Government framed, drafted and passed into law.

Addendum 2

More comeuppance for me in my strident claims that the mainstream media was not informing Canadians of the law regarding Remediation Agreements.  I just (4 March 2019) read a really excellent answer to an SNC-Lavalin question on Quora which included a link to this article in the Financial Post (28 February 2019) by Jennifer Quaid and Emilie Taman entitled "Ottawa officials keep pushing myths about 'remediation agreements' amid the SNC-Lavalin scandal."  The authors note that:  

In the specific context of prosecutions under the Corruption of Foreign Public Officials Act (under which SNC is charged), the national economic interest is explicitly excluded as a relevant factor.
Remediation agreements may often turn out to be in the national economic interest, but the decision as to whether to negotiate them cannot be driven by that consideration.

Quaid and Taman go on to explain why the legislation is such a mess and may indirectly explain why the Prime Minister doesn't seem to know the details of the legislation his government passed.

Addendum 3

Correction:  In this post I claimed that Jody Wilson-Raybould had "no power" to impose a Remediation Agreement.  My claim was an exaggeration.  The new Remediation Agreement legislation did not specify that she could interfere in the case.  However, the Act governing the Relationship between the Attorney General and the Director of Public Prosecutions did give Jody Wilson-Raybould the power to interfere in a Public Prosecution but this power has never been used and if ever it is used a written justification must be published and made public.  For more, see: A Comparison of Scandals: SNC-Lavalin Versus the Extradition of the Huawei CFO