Huawei row, O’Halloran detention threaten China’s relationship with Ireland

Name: How the arrest of Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou soured China's relations with the US and Canada
Uploaded: 2021-03-08T05:00:15.000Z
Duration: 4 min 43 s
Description: How the arrest of Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou soured China's relations with the US and Canada

Four elected officials this week join a pan-national, bipartisan group pushing hardline legislation on China

Concerns over an authoritarian shift in China are being weighed against the desire to access a 1.4 billion person market

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A woman walks past a boarded up bar in Dublin in October last year. Photo: AFP

Finbarr Bermingham

Published: 1:00pm, 8 Mar 2021Updated: 1:31pm, 8 Mar 2021

Like many small nations reliant on trade with China, Ireland has long been careful not to rock the boat on issues deemed sensitive to Beijing.

But a row over Huawei, a businessman’s ongoing lengthy detention in Shanghai, and a rising backlash against China’s human rights records may force Ireland’s hand.

Four elected officials this week joined a pan-national, bipartisan group pushing hardline legislation on China, and warned that a confluence of issues, both domestic and international, are changing Irish perceptions on China.

Even as Ireland’s leadership continues to push for more trade with the world’s second largest economy, the group warns that things are “at a tipping point”.

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How the arrest of Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou soured China's relations with the US and Canada

“China is a big trading partner for us, particularly in respect of agricultural exports. The Chinese love our milk, our dairy products have found a huge market there, but that’s not reason enough to bend over for them,” said Barry Ward, a Fine Gael Senator from Dún Laoghaire, a coastal town south of Dublin, and co-chair of the Inter-parliamentary Alliance on China (IPAC) in Ireland.