Canadian justice lawyer says Huawei CFO was dishonest

VANCOUVER, British Columbia (AP) — The dishonesty of a senior executive for Chinese communications giant Huawei Technologies put a bank at risk of violating U.S. sanctions against Iran, a Canadian justice department lawyer told an extradition hearing Thursday.

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.

The lengthy extradition proceeding is entering a phase which involves arguments over the U.S. government’s request to extradite Meng.

Justice department lawyer Robert Frater said Meng was dishonest about Huawei’s relationship with Skycom during a meeting with a HSBC executive.

“By not being honest and withholding information, HSBC was deprived of the opportunity to protect itself,” said Frater.

After the meeting, HSBC made money transfers involving Skycom which could have caused the bank a liability, Frater said.

“Given that Huawei was Skycom, the activities of Skycom and Huawei posed an actual real risk to HSBC of violating US sanctions on Iran," he said.

Frater presented case law that says even if there is not a financial loss, fraud can still occur when an institution like HSBC is persuaded to continue to provide services it might have refused had it known all the facts.

In wrapping up his submission, Frater said he disagreed with Meng’s defense team that the case against her...