Meng Wanzhou defrauded HSBC without causing loss, extradition case is told, as diplomatic storm swirls outside court
- Canadian government lawyer says Huawei executive caused HSBC to suffer ‘deprivation’ by lying about Iran business and exposing bank to potential risk
- The endgame for Meng’s extradition case coincides with China convicting Canadian Michael Spavor of espionage, and harsh exchanges between Beijing and Ottawa
A global diplomatic storm is swirling outside Meng Wanzhou’s extradition case in the Supreme Court of British Columbia – but inside, the Huawei Technologies executive’s fate may instead hinge partly on arcane Canadian case law, including a fraud involving a Nova Scotia car dealer almost 30 years ago.
A Canadian government lawyer on Thursday cited that case and others as he tried to bolster the allegation that Meng had deceived and defrauded HSBC, even though the bank suffered no economic loss.
The increasingly fraught backdrop to the final committal stage of Meng’s extradition case in Vancouver this week has included China’s conviction and sentencing of Canadian Michael Spavor for espionage and the upholding of a death sentence for drug trafficking against Canadian Robert Schellenberg, as well as harsh exchanges involving Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and China’s foreign ministry.
Robert Frater, the Canadian Justice Department’s chief general counsel who is representing US interests in the extradition case, told Associate Chief Justice Heather Holmes he expected Meng’s lawyers to depict the case as “unique and unprecedented”, but it was not.
“This is a case about lying to a bank in order to get banking services continuing to flow as before. That is not an unusual thing,” he said.
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China sentences Canadian businessman Michael Spavor to 11 years for spying
American prosecutors want Meng – who is the chief financial officer of Huawei and a daughter of its founder, Ren Zhengfei – to face trial in New York for allegedly defrauding HSBC. She was arrested at Vancouver’s airport on a US warrant on December 1, 2018, triggering the extradition battle.
