Huawei daughter back in Canada court in US extradition case

VANCOUVER, British Columbia (AP) — A senior executive for Chinese communications giant Huawei Technologies was returning to a Canadian courtroom Monday to begin a series of hearings in which her lawyers will argue her extradition to the U.S. should be halted because her rights have been violated.

Canada arrested Meng Wanzhou, the daughter of Huawei’s founder and the company’s chief financial officer, at Vancouver’s airport in late 2018. The U.S. wants her extradited to face fraud charges. Her arrest infuriated Beijing, which sees her case as a political move designed to prevent China’s rise.

The U.S. accuses Huawei of using a Hong Kong shell company called Skycom to sell equipment to Iran in violation of U.S. sanctions. It says Meng, 49, committed fraud by misleading the HSBC bank about the company’s business dealings in Iran.

Over the next several weeks, Meng’s defense team will present several justifications for halting the extradition proceedings.

They will argue her arrest was politically motivated and will point to comments made by former U.S. President Donald Trump that he was using Meng as a bargaining chip to force a better trade deal with China. They also will claim an abuse of process, saying Canada Border Services Agency officers detained and questioned Meng without a lawyer, seized her electronic devices and compelled her to give up the passcodes before her official arrest.

Her lawyers also contend the U.S. is exceeding the limits of its jurisdiction by prosecuting a foreign citizen for actions that took place in Hong Kong and that Canada was misled by the U.S. about the strength of its case.

Michael Byers, a University of British Columbia political scientist and former law professor who dealt in extradition law, said the border officers questioning Meng at the airport before she realized...