Canada’s ambassador to China has visited two Canadians who have been detained for nearly two years in apparent retaliation for the arrest Huawei Technologies CFO Meng Wanzhou on a U.S. extradition warrant. Ambassador Dominic Barton was granted onsite virtual consular access to Michael Kovrig on Nov. 19 and Michael Spavor on Nov. 10, according a […]

The recently formed Special Committee on Canada-China Relations convened this week for the first time since COVID-19 put Canada on lockdown, just as a fourth Canadian citizen was sentenced to death in China. Escalating tensions between the two countries and how the Canadian government has handled them was the subject of a hearing at the […]

China has sentenced another Canadian citizen to death on drug charges, a move that comes amid a heightened hostile attitude by the communist regime toward Canada in recent months. This is the third Canadian to be sentenced to death on drug charges in China since Canada detained a top executive of Chinese telecom giant Huawei […]

BEIJING—A Chinese court sentenced a Canadian to death on Thursday for making drugs, the third Canadian to be sentenced to death for drugs in China since Canada detained a top executive of Chinese company in 2018. The Canadian, identified as Xu Weihong, was sentenced after a trial in the southern city of Guangzhou, the Guangzhou […]

Canada should demand the immediate release of Sun Qian, a Canadian citizen and Falun Gong adherent imprisoned in China for her faith, says former Liberal justice minister Irwin Cotler. Sun was arrested at her Beijing residence in February 2017 and has been held in custody ever since. On June 30 she was sentenced by a […]

A new poll shows that 72 percent of Canadians are supportive of Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou’s extradition case continuing the court process in Canada, without intervention by the prime minister to free Meng in order to secure the release of Canadians Michael Spavor and Michael Kovrig detained in China. The Angus Reid poll found that […]

On the heels of the Beijing regime’s announcement that espionage charges have been laid against two Canadians detained in China, a new survey indicates that 80 percent of Canadians think Ottawa should speak out more strongly against China’s human rights abuses and defiance of international rules. Having informed respondents of recent accusations of rights abuses […]

China has formally charged two Canadians with spying more than 18 months after they were first arrested, officials said June 19, in a move that has widely been viewed as politically motivated. The People’s Procuratorate of Beijing Municipality filed a prosecution against former Canadian diplomat Michael Kovrig on Friday for “spying on state secrets and intelligence.” Canadian businessman Michael Spavor was […]

Thirteen Canadians who work with an Alberta-based humanitarian organization are among 15 people detained in Ethiopia, the charity said Saturday. Canadian Humanitarian said a group of 10 Canadian volunteers, three Canadians on staff, and two Ethiopian staff members were in custody in the African country on allegations they were practicing medicine without permission and had dispensed […]

OTTAWA—As two imprisoned Canadians face trials in Chinese courts where convictions are virtually assured, MPs prepared on Dec. 10 to press ahead with a parliamentary review of the Liberals’ policies toward China. Neither Michael Spavor nor Michael Kovrig has seen a lawyer or family in the year since they were each detained in what is widely seen as retribution for […]

BEIJING—China’s foreign ministry on Nov. 6 urged the re-elected Canadian government to release detained Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou amid bilateral tensions. Geng Shuang, a spokesman at the ministry, made the comment at a regular press briefing. Meng has been detained in Vancouver since December last year. She is charged in the United States with bank […]

BEIRUT—A Canadian citizen held by the Syrian government since last year was released in Lebanon on Friday and broke down in tears at a news conference, saying he thought he would be held forever. “I didn’t know if anyone knew if I was alive,” said Kristian Lee Baxter, struggling to speak as he choked back tears […]

TORONTO—A Canadian citizen has been detained in the Chinese city of Yantai, a Canadian government spokesman said on July 13, an incident that comes amid chilly diplomatic relations between the two countries. Global Affairs, as Canada’s foreign ministry is known, did not provide further details or say whether the case was related to the detention […]

Two days after the world marked 30 years since Beijing’s massacre of students on Tiananmen Square, Alex Neve of Amnesty International Canada told a Senate committee how international efforts to tackle rights abuses in China have been ineffective and urged countries to earnestly bring a human rights lens to their approach to trade with the […]

OTTAWA—Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland has again expressed concern over Beijing’s arbitrary arrest of two Canadians last December, while the opposition criticized the government’s lack of action. “We strongly condemn the arbitrary arrest of Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor,” Freeland said before the Foreign Affairs Committee of the House of Commons on May 28. “The […]

Huawei’s chief financial officer Meng Wanzhou returned to a Vancouver courtroom on March 6.

A majority of Canadians are not satisfied with how Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government has handled the deteriorating situation between Ottawa and Beijing.

SYDNEY—Australian Foreign Minister Marise Payne said on Jan. 24 that there was no evidence to suggest that the detention of a dual-national writer in China was linked to the high-profile arrests of two Canadians but that Canberra was seeking urgent clarification. Officials in Canberra confirmed on Jan. 24 Chinese-Australian Yang Hengjun, an author and former […]

The Australian government confirmed late Jan. 23 that Chinese-Australian writer Yang Hengjun has been detained in China, just as Australia’s Defence Minister Christopher Pyne embarks on an official visit to Beijing. The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade was alerted on Jan. 23 that Yang, a novelist and influential online commentator, had been detained. “On […]

The United States and Canada have issued travel warnings to their citizens who intend to visit China, and likewise China has reacted with travel warnings to its citizens who wish to visit the North American countries. The travel warnings have been issued after the arrest of Huawei’s financial chief Meng Wanzhou, and China’s retaliatory arrest […]

TORONTO—More than eight in ten Canadians have a negative impression of the Chinese regime and more than half believe Canada was right to detain a high-level Huawei executive for possible extradition to the United States, according to a Nanos survey released on Jan. 9. The survey also found that a majority of Canadians say they […]

For citizens of Canada–or for that matter, citizens of any democratic country–the Huawei controversies (for there are several separate, though linked issues) might be better understood by remembering the parable of the scorpion and the frog. For those who have forgotten the story, it involves a scorpion asking a frog to carry it across the […]

A group of Central American migrants climbed over a border fence in Tijuana on Dec. 12. But these migrants did not get far after they jumped the fence. There are a series of fences along the international line patrolled by U.S. border patrol officials, where these migrants were detained by officers. Some migrants are jumping […]

BEIJING—Canada’s Foreign Ministry said it has been unable to contact Canadian businessman Michael Spavor, since he notified the government that he was being questioned by Chinese authorities. Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland earlier told reporters that a second Canadian citizen could be in trouble in China. “We are aware of a Canadian who got in […]

OTTAWA—Two lawyers representing Sun Qian, a Canadian citizen detained in China, have withdrawn from the case due to pressure from the Chinese authorities, leaving Sun unrepresented since last week. A Chinese-Canadian businesswoman from Vancouver who became a citizen in 2007, Sun was detained by the Chinese authorities in February 2017 for practising the traditional spiritual […]

Former MP and justice minister Irwin Cotler, who is acting as legal counsel for Canadian citizen Sun Qian, says the Chinese authorities should abide by their own laws and release Sun, currently in detention in Beijing. “We call on the Chinese authorities to honour their own rule of law, to cease and desist from persecution […]

Globe and Mail journalist Nathan VanderKlippe, who was briefly detained by Chinese police earlier this week, says he travelled to Elishku in China’s volatile Xinjiang region to find out more about a 2014 violent confrontation between Chinese authorities and the ethnic Uyghurs that exiled groups say resulted in 2,000 deaths. VanderKlippe, the Globe’s Beijing correspondent, […]

A Chinese-Canadian businesswoman who practices Falun Gong has been held against her will by the Beijing security apparatus since February. Sun Qian, 51, is the vice president of Beijing Leadman Biochemistry Co., Ltd., a company she co-founded with her husband Shen Guangqian in 1997.  Sun was at her residence in Beijing’s Chaoyang district on Feb. […]

The world’s largest online film festival has awarded a Vancouver documentary filmmaker with its top prize.

Two Members of Parliament in Canada have made a public and forceful call for the Chinese authorities to release a Falun Gong practitioner who has been on a hunger strike for over a month.