{"id":196763,"date":"2019-01-07T21:44:28","date_gmt":"2019-01-08T02:44:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=196763"},"modified":"2019-01-07T21:44:28","modified_gmt":"2019-01-08T02:44:28","slug":"trump-respects-rule-of-law-in-extradition-case-trudeaus-office-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2019\/01\/07\/trump-respects-rule-of-law-in-extradition-case-trudeaus-office-says\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump respects ‘rule of law’ in extradition case, Trudeau’s office says"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
In a summary of a phone call Monday between Trump and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, the PMO indicated the leaders discussed the high-profile U.S. extradition request \u2014 though Meng was not named \u2014 and agreed on the importance of respecting the independence of judges and the rule of law. (File Photo<\/a>: Justin Trudeau\/Facebook<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

OTTAWA \u2014 Donald Trump has affirmed his respect for judicial independence, the Prime Minister’s Office says, less than a month after the U.S. president baldly said he would intervene in Meng Wanzhou’s pending extradition from Canada if it would help forge a trade deal with China.<\/p>\n

In a summary of a phone call Monday between Trump and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, the PMO indicated the leaders discussed the high-profile U.S. extradition request \u2014 though Meng was not named \u2014 and agreed on the importance of respecting the independence of judges and the rule of law.<\/p>\n

China has pressed Canada to get Meng freed from the extradition process, which\u00a0Canadian\u00a0politicians have replied they simply aren’t allowed to do.<\/p>\n

Trudeau also thanked Trump for the \u201cstrong statements of support\u201d by the U.S. in response to the \u201carbitrary detention\u201d of two Canadians in China, the summary says. \u201cThe two leaders agreed to continue to seek their release.\u201d<\/p>\n

Entrepreneur Michael Spavor and fellow\u00a0Canadian\u00a0Michael Kovrig, a diplomat on leave from Global Affairs Canada, were taken into Chinese custody on security grounds in December.<\/p>\n

Beijing’s actions came just days after\u00a0Canadian\u00a0authorities in Vancouver arrested Meng, a senior executive with Chinese firm Huawei Technologies, who is wanted by the U.S. on fraud charges.<\/p>\n

Meng’s arrest infuriated Beijing, and many western analysts see China’s detention of Spavor and Kovrig as retaliation.<\/p>\n

Trudeau said at the time that Canada, which has an extradition treaty with the U.S., was merely following standard legal protocol.<\/p>\n

Kelly Craft, the U.S. ambassador to Canada, told reporters it was \u201cabsolutely false\u201d to assume a political motive behind Meng’s arrest. However, Trump muddied the waters the same day by telling Reuters in an interview that he would \u201ccertainly intervene\u201d in Meng’s case \u201cif I thought it was necessary\u201d to help ensure a trade deal with China.<\/p>\n

Canada has called for the immediate release of Kovrig and Spavor. Each man has had a single consular visit from John McCallum, Ottawa’s ambassador to China.<\/p>\n

A\u00a0Canadian\u00a0parliamentary delegation, long scheduled to visit China, is doing what it can this week to help secure the pair’s freedom.<\/p>\n

A Monday opinion piece in the China Daily newspaper, published by the country’s Communist Party, accused Canada of acting \u201cas a loyal adherent of the U.S. in the Meng detention drama.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBy continuing to follow the U.S., either passively or actively, Canada will eventually harm its national interests,\u201d said the article by Li Qingsi, a professor of international studies at Renmin University in China. \u201cIf Canada insists on following the old track, it may not benefit much from a big trading partner like China.\u201d<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, a friend of Spavor says he is concerned about the detained\u00a0Canadian’s well-being and financial future now that an online fundraising effort in his name has been derailed.<\/p>\n

Andray Abrahamian, a lecturer at Stanford University in California, was among the organizers of a GoFundMe campaign for Spavor.<\/p>\n

\u201cI worry about many things, starting with his health and emotional well-being,\u201d Abrahamian said Monday.<\/p>\n

GoFundMe said the campaign in Spavor’s name was shut down because its third-party payment processor, which made the decision, was unable to handle the donations.<\/p>\n

GoFundMe spokeswoman Rachel Hollis would not elaborate on the reason, but said the fundraising portal relies on such processors to make sure money transfers made online \u201care securely processed and verified, helping us to keep GoFundMe the safest place to donate online.\u201d<\/p>\n

The backers were told \u201cit was for a ‘terms and conditions’ violation, but nothing more specific than that,\u201d Abrahamian said. \u201cBasically, nearly everybody’s money was refunded Friday without notice, then the next day the page was shut down.\u201d<\/p>\n

Spavor is director of the Paektu Cultural Exchange, an organization that facilitates sporting, cultural, tourism and business exchanges with North Korea \u2014 a largely isolated country subject to a number of international sanctions over its nuclear-weapons program.<\/p>\n

Abrahamian said the fundraising effort was intended to create \u201ca little pot of money\u201d to help with Spavor’s legal fees or other costs and, when the stressful experience is over, to aid his recovery and readjustment.<\/p>\n

\u201cOnce the issue with China is resolved, he probably won’t be able to transit through that country, meaning he won’t be able to continue his work promoting exchanges,\u201d Abrahamian said.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo we wanted to help buy him some time while he figures out what’s next. We also were hoping his family could use the money to have his possessions collected and shipped back to Canada.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe’re trying to figure out how to best solicit donations again, but are afraid we won’t be as successful as this past attempt. It was Christmastime, after all.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

OTTAWA \u2014 Donald Trump has affirmed his respect for judicial independence, the Prime Minister’s Office says, less than a month …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":166620,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-196763","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news-ca","category-news","mauthors-jim-bronskill","mauthors-the-canadian-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196763","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=196763"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196763\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/166620"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=196763"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=196763"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=196763"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}