The daughter of the founder of Huawei Technologies, one of the world's leading telecommunications hardware manufacturers, was arrested in Canada at the request of the United States. Meng Wanzhou, also known as Sabrina Meng is Huawei's vice president and chief financial officer. She is the daughter of Ren Zhengfei, a former Chinese People's Army officer who founded the company in 1988 and has since amassed an estimated $ 3,5 billion personal fortune. Due to her family background and her position at Huawei, Meng is often referred to as "a member of the Chinese royal family".
Few details of Meng's arrest have been made public. On Wednesday, the Canada Department of Justice confirmed that Huawei's CFO has been arrested. The Justice Department also confirmed that the arrest came at the request of US law enforcement officials. In a carefully worded statement, the Canadian government said Meng is "wanted in the United States" and that her bail hearing will take place next Friday. On Wednesday, Canadian newspaper The Globe and Mail quoted an unnamed "Canadian law enforcement source with knowledge of the arrest," who said US authorities had evidence that Meng "attempted to circumvent the US embargo against Iran ". This statement appears to refer to reports reported in Western media in April of this year that the U.S. departments of trade and treasury were probing suspected violations of Washington's sanctions against Iran and North Korea since part of Huawei.
The Chinese embassy in Canada immediately protested that Huawei's CFO had been detained despite "not violating any American or Canadian law". In a statement released Wednesday, the embassy added that it had "made severe statements" to the Canadian government and "urged them to immediately restore Ms. Meng Wanzhou's personal freedom." Meanwhile, a representative from Huawei's headquarters in southern China's Shenzhen city told the BBC that the company is confident that "the Canadian and US judicial systems will eventually come to a fair conclusion" of the case.
Several officials in the United States, United Kingdom, Australia and other Western countries have repeatedly marked Huawei as a company close to the Chinese government and its intelligence agencies. In 2011, the US Open Source Center, which is the open source intelligence branch of the office of the director of national intelligence, became the first US government agency to openly link Huawei with the Chinese intelligence establishment. In 2013, the UK government also released an official report on Huawei's involvement in the UK Cyber Security Assessment Center in Oxfordshire, England, following a British Parliament document raising strong concerns about the Chinese company's ties to the UK. Beijing government. In 2017, the Australian government expressed concern over Huawei's plan to provide high-speed internet to the Solomon Islands, a small Pacific island nation with which Australia shares important internet resources.