The Hongcouver | Once branded spies, Chinese tech trio settles in Canada after immigration officials back down

Three ex-employees of Chinese tech giant Huawei, who were accused of espionage by Canadian authorities during their immigration applications, have now been granted permanent residency after officials backed down on the unproven and explosive claims, the South China Morning Post has learned.

Jean-Francois Harvey, whose Harvey Law Group acted on behalf of the mainland Chinese trio, said the now-withdrawn accusations appeared to have been the work of a single officer in the Canadian consulate-general’s office in Hong Kong.

Harvey said an identification code on correspondence proved that the same case officer dealt with all three clients, who have settled in Canada in the past four months.

They were “definitely not” spies, said the lawyer.

The SCMP reported last May that two of the would-be immigrants had been informed by Canada’s immigration department that their applications for permanent residency were going to be rejected.

“[There] are reasonable grounds to believe that you are a member of the inadmissible class of persons described in section 34(1)(f) of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act,” read a letter to one of the then-employees of Huawei. That refers to people who belong to an organisation engaged in espionage, government subversion or terrorism. A second applicant was told the same in relation to their spouse, who was employed by Huawei at the time.