Canada’s spy agency is under pressure after Justin Trudeau and his closest advisers say they were never made aware of a report that Beijing “clandestinely and deceptively” interfered in both the 2019 and 2021 federal elections. Canada is in the midst of a contentious public inquiry “examining and assessing” foreign interference by China, Russia, and other foreign states and non-state actors, and this week the prime minister, Justin Trudeau, testified under oath about the steps his government took to respond to the threat of meddling. In his appearance, which lasted…
Tag: Canada
China meddled in past two Canada elections, says Justin Trudeau
China tried to meddle in the past two Canadian elections but the results were not affected and it was “improbable” Beijing preferred any one party over another, prime minister Justin Trudeau has told an official inquiry. In sworn testimony before a commission conducting a public inquiry into alleged foreign interference in the 2019 and 2021 Canadian elections, Trudeau answered questions about intelligence briefings he had received and asserted the elections were “free and fair”. “Despite attempts by foreign states to interfere, those elections held in their integrity. They were decided…
India and Pakistan tried to meddle in Canada elections, spy agency says
Canada’s spy agency has declared that the governments of India and Pakistan probably attempted to meddle in its elections. As a closely watched public inquiry investigates the scope of foreign interference, on Thursday night the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) released a report suggesting a growing number of countries see Canada – and particularly its large diaspora populations – as a target for subterfuge. It said India had “intent to interfere and likely conducted clandestine activities” in the 2021 Canadian federal election, including the use of a government proxy agent…
U.S. Accuses Two Men of Stealing Tesla Trade Secrets
A Canadian man who lives in China was arrested Tuesday and held in New York after he and a business partner were accused of trying to sell secret battery manufacturing technology belonging to Tesla. Federal prosecutors in Brooklyn asked a judge to hold Klaus Pflugbeil without bail on a charge of theft of trade secrets. He was arrested after meeting with undercover agents Tuesday on Long Island and trying to sell them technology used to produce battery parts, the office of the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New…
Michael Spavor Reaches Settlement With Canada Over Detention by China
The government of Canada has reached a financial settlement with one of two Canadian men it contends were arbitrarily detained for nearly three years by China in a retaliatory move, the man’s lawyer said. John K. Phillips, who represents Michael Spavor, told The Associated Press Wednesday evening that “I am only able to say that the matter between Mr. Spavor and the government of Canada has been resolved.” Mr. Spavor, a businessman who had extensive dealings in North Korea, and Michael Kovrig, a then a Canadian diplomat who was on…
Canada reaches settlement with Michael Spavor over detention in China
Canada’s federal government has reached a million-dollar compensation settlement with Michael Spavor, a businessman who was held by China for nearly three years amid a broader diplomatic feud between the two countries. Spavor and Michael Kovrig, who became known as “the two Michaels”, were detained by Beijing in December 2018 in apparent retaliation for the arrest in Vancouver of the senior Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou on a US warrant. All three were later released. In November Spavor was reported to have threatened to sue both Canada and Kovrig, alleging that…
Scientists in Canada Passed Secrets to China, Investigations Find
Two scientists who worked at Canada’s top microbiology lab passed on secret scientific information to China, and one of them was a “realistic and credible threat to Canada’s economic security,” documents from the national intelligence agency and a security investigation show. The hundreds of pages of reports about the two researchers, Xiangguo Qiu and Keding Cheng, who were married and born in China, were released to the House of Commons late Wednesday after a national security review by a special parliamentary committee and a panel of three retired senior judges.…
Scientist fed classified information to China, says Canada intelligence report
A leading research scientist at Canada’s highest-security laboratory provided confidential scientific information to Chinese institutions, met secretly with officials and posed “a realistic and credible threat to Canada’s economic security” according to newly released intelligence reports. The dismissal of Xiangguo Qiu and her husband, Keding Cheng has been shrouded in mystery ever since the couple were escorted from Winnipeg’s National Microbiology Laboratory in 2019 and formally fired two years later. Intelligence assessments released late on Wednesday afternoon alleged that Qiu’s “close and clandestine relationships” with Chinese institutions which showed a…
Chinese hackers infiltrated plane, train and water systems for five years, US says
An advanced group of Chinese hackers taking aim at critical US infrastructure has been active for as long as half a decade, American and allied intelligence agencies said in a joint statement on Wednesday. The US National Security Agency, US cyber watchdog CISA, the FBI and the Transportation Security Administration said that the group known as Volt Typhoon had quietly burrowed into the networks of aviation, rail, mass transit, highway, maritime, pipeline, water and sewage organizations. None of the organizations were identified by name, but the statement said that US…
Canada intelligence operation put diplomats in legal ‘grey zone’ – report
A controversial intelligence-gathering program run by Canada’s foreign affairs ministry operates in a “distinctly grey zone”, puts its officers at risk and breaches global diplomatic conventions, says a damning watchdog report. Canada’s global security reporting program (GSRP), a critical part of the foreign ministry’s security and intelligence footprint overseas, places officers in countries with “poor human rights records” including Ethiopia, India, Egypt, Turkey, Israel and China. The program has received renewed scrutiny in recent months following reports that Michael Spavor, a Canadian jailed in China for nearly three years, was…