China’s “unlawful detention” of two Canadians in the last week is “unacceptable,” Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Friday following meetings with his northern counterparts.
“The unlawful detention of two Canadian citizens is unacceptable,” Pompeo told reporters at a press briefing with Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland. “They ought to be returned.”
China detained two Canadian diplomats — one businessman, another a former diplomat — just days after Canada arrested a top executive from Huawei, a major technology company that the U.S. government accuses of violating sanctions on Iran. The detentions are widely regarded as Chinese retaliation against Canada, but officials on all sides maintain that none of the arrests have anything to do with political motivations.
“In Canada, there has been to this point no political interference in this issue at all,” Freeland told reporters at the State Department. “For Canada, this is a question of living up to our treaty obligations.”
Canadian authorities arrested Huawei chief financial officer Sabrina Meng Wanzho as she traveled through Vancouver. She has been released on bond, while a Canadian judge evaluates the case for extraditing her to the United States to be charged for violating sanctions on Iran.
A top Chinese diplomat in Beijing implied that former diplomat Michael Kovrig was arrested because his employer, the International Crisis Group, “has not legally registered or submitted documents” with the Communist government. But China’s ambassador to Canada also seemed to connect the dance of detentions.
“Those who accuse China of detaining some person in retaliation for the arrest of Ms Meng should first reflect on the actions of the Canadian side,” Ambassador Lu Shaye wrote in an op-ed for Canadian media. “It is both ignominious and hypocritical to revile China with double standards.”
Freeland denied those accusations repeatedly. “Canada is a rule-of-law country,” Freeland said. “Those democratic values include the fact that in both countries we have a deep regard for the rule of law and strong and independent judiciaries.”
Pompeo affirmed that his team will try to help secure the release of Kovrig and businessman Michael Spavor, while trying to keep the issues separate from the broader trade war underway between the two powers.
“We have lots of complicated issues going on with china today all around the world and we work on each of those to get good outcomes for the people of the United States of America and respecting the rule of law every step of the way,” he said. “We’re going to work to get every citizen unlawfully detained all around the world returned to the country to which they have the very right to go back to.”
