Lawyers for Huawei Technologies on Wednesday asked a Canadian court to immediately stay proceedings seeking to extradite the company's Chief Financial Officer Meng Wanzhou to the United States.
Benjamin Howes, vice president of media affairs at Huawei, said that the extradition does not meet the Canadian standard of double criminality.
The standard means that the alleged conduct for which Meng was arrested in 2018 has to be illegal in both countries for her to be extradited.
Howes said the company is arguing that because Canada did not have sanctions against Iran at the time Canadian officials authorized commencing with the extradition process, double criminality cannot be met, Reuters reported.
"The application doesn't seek to challenge whether the facts behind the logic of this charge are true or not," said Howes.
Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou leaves her home for a hearing at British Columbia supreme court, in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, September 23, 2019. /VCG Photo
Meng was arrested on December 1, 2018, at Vancouver's airport at the request of the United States, which is seeking her extradition on fraud charges. Both Meng and Huawei have repeatedly denied any wrongdoing.
On December 11, 2018, Meng was released on a 7.5 million-U.S.-dollar-bail at a hearing after being detained by Canadian authorities for 10 days.
This year, Howes said in a statement that allegations against Meng do not constitute a crime. The extradition request violates a core principle of Canadian extradition law.
Meng's lawyers will bring a motion in January 2020 challenging the U.S. request to extradite her on claims of fraud, said the statement.
On September 24, 2019, Meng returned to a Vancouver court as her lawyers argued that Canadian authorities abused their powers and violated her rights to gather evidence against her, a claim the government denies.
For Meng's case, China has repeatedly stated its solemn stance on the matter, urging the U.S. to withdraw its arrest warrant for Meng.
Foreign Ministry spokesperson Geng Shuang said in August that the United States is fabricating the incident of Meng and mobilizing state force to crack down on Chinese high-tech companies.
(Cover: Huawei's Chief Financial Officer Meng Wanzhou in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, May 8, 2019. /VCG Photo)
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