A human rights organization has been shut out of a Canada-China business forum in a move reminiscent of a similar incident in June when the same business lobby barred a reporter from a luncheon event for Chinese Foreign Affairs Minister Yang Jiechi.
On its website, forum host Canada China Business Council (CCBC) welcomes the public to attend the September 15 event by registering under non-member status.
But just days after Dermod Travis of the Canada Tibet Committee registered, the council informed him that the CTC’s presence would be “inappropriate” because of its “political” mandate.
“To turn around and deny a registration because you find the organization may not fit with what your particular agenda is that day I think flies in the face of what we should be trying to defend in China,” Travis says.
“I think they’re concerned that our presence would upset the representatives of Chinese businesses and government that will be attending the forum.”
Travis explains that he wanted to attend the event to meet with some of the Canadian companies that are doing business in China in order to “encourage them to push for human rights” in the one-party state.
“It was not our intent to use the registration to disrupt their activities. As a participant I frankly don’t know how they would even know that I was with the Canada Tibet Committee.”
Victor Hayes, CCBC's director of public relations, says the council “encourages in-depth discussions among its members on corporate social responsibility (CSR) issues” and has initiated a bi-annual business excellence awards program, one of which is for outstanding CSR.
“However, the 3rd Canada China Business Forum is solely focused on developing trade and investment relationships between Canadian and Chinese companies. Therefore, in this forum, a human rights discussion would be inappropriate,” he says.
In June, Christina Spencer, a Parliament Hill reporter for Sun Media who has written articles critical of China’s communist regime, was turned away when she tried to attend a luncheon event in honour of Yang Jiechi at the Chateau Laurier Hotel in Ottawa.
At the time, Hayes said space was limited so only a small number of media were invited, while a spokesperson for the council said the reporter wasn’t allowed in because she hadn't been invited.
In 2005, both The Epoch Times and New Tang Dynasty Television were refused entry to a CCBC-organized banquet for Hu Jintao in Toronto. The CCBC at the time again cited “space limitations” for excluding the two media outlets that frequently highlight the Chinese regime’s human rights abuses.
The CTC had urged Trade Minister Stockwell Day to decline the CCBC’s invitation to speak at the forum. But Melisa Leclerc, Day’s spokesperson, told The Epoch Times Tuesday that because of a prior engagement, Day would be unable to accept the invitation.
Travis says the CTC has been “engaged” with some Canadian companies that do business in China, such as Continental Minerals and Bombardier, and that the group wants to expand its work on CSR in China and Tibet.
“There are over 200 members in the Canada China Business Council and they should be going to China with one message, and that is that there is a real place for human rights in China, and ‘we will be bringing our values to our operations in China.’”
The visiting Chinese delegation includes 150 corporate and government leaders representing a cross-section of China’s economy.