China’s ambassador warns Canada against Huawei 5G ban

Beijing’s ambassador has warned that Canada risks driving away Chinese investors and companies if it bans Huawei Technologies from its 5G internet infrastructure, saying he hoped Canada had learned a lesson from the outcome of the “Meng Wanzhou incident”.

Cong Peiwu, addressing a webinar hosted by the Centre for International Governance Innovation think tank on Tuesday, contended that security concerns surrounding Huawei had been “invented by the United States and the main purpose is to crack down on Huawei”.

Ottawa has been reviewing Huawei’s fate in the nation’s 5G network for three years amid concerns about the potential for Chinese espionage, but the process was delayed when Meng, the company’s chief financial officer, was arrested in Vancouver in December 2018 on a US fraud warrant.

That triggered a furious response from Beijing, and threw China-Canada relations into turmoil. Canadians Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor were arrested and accused of spying, but their detentions were widely seen as retaliation for Meng’s treatment.

On September 24, China freed the pair known as the two Michaels and they flew out of Beijing, just as a flight carrying Meng took off from Vancouver. The releases came hours after Meng struck a deferred prosecution agreement with US authorities.

Cong said Huawei’s presence in the Canadian 5G arena should be seen as a purely business matter, and “it is hoped that lessons will be learned” from Meng’s case.

“[Some are] trying to politicise the issue and to try to abuse and overstretch the concept of national security,” said Cong.

“That is not conducive to people doing business here in Canada. You would be sending out a very strong signal to Chinese companies.”

He urged Canada not to listen to US concerns about Huawei and instead provide a “just, fair, open and non-discriminatory business environment for Chinese investors and companies”.

The government of Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has flagged a decision on Huawei soon, with officials suggesting it would come during the current sitting of parliament; Trudeau said after winning the September 20 election that it would be announced in a matter of weeks.

In a 90-minute discussion with CIGI president Rohinton Medhora, Cong repeatedly referred to US President Joe Biden’s Summit for Democracy, scheduled for Thursday and Friday.

China was not among the 110 countries invited to the summit and has criticised the US for inviting representatives from Taiwan, the self-ruled island that Beijing considers a breakaway province.

“Who gives the US the right to determine which country is democratic or not … there are so many systems for democracy around the world. Certainly, the US is in no position to decide,” said Cong.

He also addressed concerns about the treatment of the Uygur population in China’s far-western province of Xinjiang, which has been branded genocide by the US and some European governments, as well as by Canada’s parliament.

“It’s the lie of the century,” said Cong, who added that “all the people from different ethnic groups are living in harmony and they’re enjoying happy lives”.

Asked about a network of detention facilities in Xinjiang that critics have likened to concentration camps, Cong said the facilities were not prisons.

“Those are actually vocational educational schools for those people who are radicalised by extremist thinking,” said Cong.