Good morning,
A diplomatic dispute between Canada and China began last month when Canadian authorities arrest Chinese businesswoman Meng Wanzhou at the Vancouver airport, on the request of authorities in the United States, where she is wanted in a fraud investigation for allegedly violating U.S. sanctions against Iran. After that, China detained two Canadians and imposed a death penalty on a third.
The U.S. has not yet filed a formal extradition request for Ms. Meng to be sent to the United States. The deadline is Jan. 30, and the filing will come very soon, says Canada’s ambassador to the U.S., David MacNaughton.
“[The Americans] are the ones seeking to have the full force of American law brought against [Ms. Meng] and yet we are the ones who are paying the price. Our citizens are,” Mr. MacNaughton told The Globe in an exclusive interview.
The extradition case will then go to a judge, a process that is not likely to be quick.
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TODAY’S HEADLINES
The top two officials of the B.C. legislature were recently suspended and walked out of the building, but at the time it wasn’t clear what the allegations were against the two men. Now we know: In a report from the speaker, the two men are alleged to have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars inappropriately, on things from travel to luxury clothing items. The two men, Craig James and Gary Lenz, say the allegations are “completely false and untrue.”
Alberta Premier Rachel Notley is poised to announce today a $2-billion investment in an upgrading facility to squeeze more Alberta oil into existing pipelines.
Ontario Premier Doug Ford says the federal carbon-pricing plan will trigger a recession, a claim that economists said was highly unlikely.
Ontario’s Community Safety deputy minister Mario Di Tommaso, who recently retired from the Toronto police, is being thrown a retirement party by his former colleagues this week – one at which corporations are allowed to pay for expensive tables. “Upon reflection, we can understand how some may perceive this as inappropriate,” police spokeswoman Meaghan Gray said.
Quebec has a friend in the federal Conservative Party, says Leader Andrew Scheer, who, as prime minister, would help the province temporarily reduce the number of immigrants it takes in and allow for a “values” and language test for newcomers.
The Assembly of First Nations and the federal government have come to an agreement that promises to fund students on reserves at the same levels as other students in Canada.
Tony Clement, the MP and former cabinet minister who quit the Conservative caucus in the fall, has had the culprits behind his sexting scandal revealed: Police in the Ivory Coast have charged two men for allegedly posing as a woman online and trying to blackmail Mr. Clement.
Belinda Stronach has hit back in court filings against her father, Frank, alleging he misspent hundreds of millions of dollars on things such as massive sculptures and a brief run for president in Austria.
And a sad story out of Montreal: Helene Rowley Hotte, the 93-year-old mother of former Bloc Québécois leader Gilles Duceppe, was found dead in the snow outside her seniors' residence. She had apparently left the building because of a 4 a.m. fire alarm, but when the door automatically locked behind her, she was unable to get back in. The coroner’s office is investigating.
Campbell Clark (The Globe and Mail) on the next election: “[Conservative Leader Andrew] Scheer’s problem is that he’s giving the Liberals a canvas to paint on. It isn’t that he doesn’t have a plan, it’s that he hasn’t given a strong impression of what kind of thing he’d do. He’s got a crime policy, but mostly, he’s stuck to opposing."
Andrew Coyne (National Post) on the federal courting of Quebec voters: “If [Premier François Legault’s] intent was to set off a bidding war among the federal parties, he needn’t have bothered. With the Quebec vote in play this election, thanks to the collapse of the NDP and the Bloc, in a way it has not been in decades, the bidding war started long ago.”
Lise Ravary (Montreal Gazette) on the political climate in Quebec: “As much as francophones are still enjoying the calming effect François Legault has on Quebec politics since the Coalition Avenir Quebec’s victory in October, the opposite seems to be happening among anglophones and allophones. People worry about the proposed disappearance of school boards and about the stricter application of Bill 101 promised by the minister in charge Nathalie Roy. They cannot see the number of anglophone and immigrant government workers increase any time soon — a real problem that needs to be fixed if bridge building is to be meaningful.”
Noa Mendelsohn Aviv (The Globe and Mail) on solitary confinement: “There was a time when an unconstitutional government policy was not something lamented then simply rebranded. Once a court found it unconstitutional, the practice just ... ended, especially when politicians had campaigned against it. Not so solitary confinement – an old practice that today’s Parliament loves to hate, hates to love, but just keeps on doing.”
More than 100 diplomats and academics on the two Canadians detained in China: “We, the undersigned scholars, former diplomats and others with an interest in understanding China and building bridges, are deeply concerned about the recent detentions of Canadian citizens Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor. We request that you immediately release Mr. Kovrig and Mr. Spavor so that they may be reunited with their families.”
Doug Saunders (The Globe and Mail) on Canada-China relations: “Before, it was possible to argue that China’s government and its state-owned enterprises were one thing, and its private-sector entrepreneurs quite another. But, if a Canadian legal or policy challenge to Huawei – the largest of those supposedly independent private-sector companies – provokes the Chinese state to imprison and demand the execution of Canadian diplomats and citizens, as well as provoking angry threats directed at the Canadian state from Chinese ministers and an ambassador, then there is no easy separation of private sector and authoritarian government.”
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Chris Hannay