Beijing: China Tuesday warned the US and Canada that it will “take action” against them if they went ahead with the extradition of the CFO of Chinese telecom giant Huawei to America and accused both the countries of “abusing” their extradition treaty.
Meng Wanzhou, Huawei’s global chief financial officer, was arrested in Canada December 1 and faces extradition to the US, which alleges that she covered up her company’s links to a firm that tried to sell equipment to Iran despite sanctions linked to its nuclear programme.
If found guilty Meng, the daughter of Huawei founder Ren Zhengfei, could be jailed for up to 30 years.
In November, the US reimposed punitive measures targeting the Iranian oil and financial sectors in what was termed as “the toughest sanctions ever placed” against Iran. The measures are the most concrete result yet of US President Donald Trump’s controversial decision in May to abandon the multi-nation nuclear deal with Tehran.
“China will take action in response to measures taken by the US,” Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying warned.
“Everyone has to be held responsible for their own actions. Both the US and Canada should be aware of the seriousness of the case and take steps to rectify the mistake,” Hua said.
Hua said the case was an abuse of extradition convention, and called on the US to withdraw the request.
Canada’s daily Globe and Mail reported Tuesday that the US will file an extradition request on allegations of banking fraud related to the violations of the US sanctions against Iran.
The report said Canada’s ambassador to the US David Mac Naughton has met with senior White House and the US State Department officials about Meng’s case several times.
The ambassador was quoted as saying that he has expressed Canada’s anger and resentment to Washington about the dispute that resulted from Meng’s arrest in December.