US improperly provided evidence to judge in Meng Wanzhou’s Canadian extradition case, lawyer claims
- The original US record of the fraud case against Meng was ‘manifestly unreliable’, but an updated version sought to sidestep scrutiny, Frank Addario says
- The Huawei executive says her rights were abused by American prosecutors, but a Canadian government lawyer representing the US says they acted ‘honourably’
United States authorities were improperly trying to put evidence before the judge in Meng Wanzhou’s extradition hearing, a lawyer for the Huawei Technologies executive told the long-running proceedings in Vancouver on Friday.
Meng, who is Huawei’s chief financial officer and daughter of company founder Ren Zhengfei, is accused by the US of defrauding HSBC by lying to the bank about Huawei’s business activities in Iran, conducted via an affiliate called Skycom, thus putting the bank at risk of breaching American sanctions on Tehran.
Meng denies defrauding HSBC.
Central to the case is a PowerPoint presentation Meng made to a HSBC banker in a Hong Kong teahouse in 2013.
Meng’s lawyer, Frank Addario, took issue on Friday with an amended version of the record of the case [ROC], a summary of the US prosecution’s position put before the extradition hearings in the Supreme Court of British Columbia.
Addario had earlier said the original ROC was intended to deceive the Canadian court. It was “manifestly unreliable” because it omitted part of the PowerPoint presentation that said Huawei had a “controllable” business relationship with Skycom in Iran, undermining claims that Meng lied about the companies’ connection.
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But on Friday, Addario said that the amended version of the ROC represented an unfair attempt to put new evidence before Associate Chief Justice Heather Holmes, sidestepping typical scrutiny such as cross-examination.
While the ROCs were part of the certification process for the hearing, the new version that included the word “controllable” was also being used for evidentiary value, he said, with Holmes invited to draw inferences from it about the merits of Meng’s arguments.
This is the final scheduled phase of hearings in the sprawling extradition battle, which began with Meng’s arrest at Vancouver International Airport on December 1, 2018.
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This week, they have been devoted to the “third branch” of Meng’s argument that she is the victim of an abuse of process regarding the allegedly misleading ROC. The only remedy is to stay proceedings and free Meng, her lawyers contend.
The hearing was adjourned until Monday.
The case will move to the committal stage on Wednesday, which could continue until August 20. After that, Holmes will decide whether to release Meng or recommend to Canadian Justice Minister David Lametti that she be sent to New York for trial.
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On Thursday, Canadian government lawyer Monika Rahman, representing US interests in the case, said the Americans had acted “honourably” and had not been deceptive. Because an ROC is a summary, the US was not obliged to include everything it knew about the case, she said.
The current hearings may represent the endgame for Meng’s extradition fight, which has assumed huge symbolic importance in China. Her arrest infuriated Beijing and triggered a continuing crisis in Chinese relations with Ottawa and Washington.
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Two Canadians, Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor, were swiftly arrested in China; they were tried for espionage this year but verdicts have not been announced. Canada’s government has said the men are victims of arbitrary detention and “hostage diplomacy”.
However, appeals could drag out Meng’s extradition case for years, regardless of what Holmes decides.
In addition to the claims about the ROC, the other branches of Meng’s abuse argument that have already been heard are: that the US case is a politically tainted process intended by former US president Donald Trump to help win his trade war with China; that Meng’s Canadian Charter rights were violated by police and border officers; and that the prosecution is contrary to international law.
