Beijing blames Canada for Huawei arrest and threatens ‘grave consequences for hurting feelings of Chinese people’
- Beijing escalates dispute over arrest of Sabrina Meng Wanzhou by lodging diplomatic protest
- China official Xinhua news agency attacks Canadian PM Justin Trudeau for not telling Beijing in advance and ‘letting this nasty thing happen’
China has ratcheted up the pressure on Canada to release the detained executive of Huawei Technologies over the weekend by threatening “grave consequences” and accusing Canada of “hurting the feelings of the Chinese people”, escalating the case into one of the worst diplomatic rows between Beijing and Ottawa.
Chinese foreign vice-minister Le Yucheng on Saturday summoned Canadian ambassador John McCallum on Saturday night to lodge a “strong protest” against the arrest of Sabrina Meng Wanzhou in Vancouver and urged Ottawa to release Meng immediately, according to a brief foreign ministry statement.
China also summoned Terry Branstad, the US ambassador in China, on Sunday and “lodged solemn representations and strong protests” against Meng’s case. Le told Branstad that the US must immediately correct its wrong action and vacate an order for her arrest.
China told the US side that it would take further steps based on Washington’s response but fell short of warning “grave consequences” as it did to Canada.
Meng, the chief financial officer at Huawei and a daughter of the Chinese telecom giant’s founder, was arrested in Vancouver on December 1 and faces extradition to the United States, which alleges that she covered up her company’s links to a firm that tried to sell equipment to Iran in defiance of sanctions.
The arrest of Meng in Canada, which took place on the same night that Chinese President Xi Jinping and US President Donald Trump dined together in Buenos Aires, has infuriated Beijing.
