Two Canadians living in China for decades are being detained on suspicion of spying and could face penalties of imprisonment or death. This comes one week after Canada accused Chinese hackers of infiltrating computers at the National Research Council of Canada.
Listen‘A very, very serious charge’
“It’s certainly a very, very serious charge,” says Charles Burton, a professor at Brock University and a former advisor to the Canadian embassy in Beijing. “According to the Chinese foreign ministry, Kevin and Julia Dawn Garratt, who are natives of Vancouver, are suspected of collecting and stealing intelligence material in Dandong, Liaoning (which is on the Korean border), about Chinese military targets and important national defense research projects and engaging in activities threatening to Chinese national security. So the charge is very serious.”
Couple set up orphanages, kindergartens
The Garratts owned a coffee shop popular with Christian missionaries and people wanting to learn English. Their son, Simeon said he was baffled by the charges and that his parents had organized orphanages, kindergartens, and translation companies with the singular goal of helping the Chinese people.
Burton agrees the charges against the Garratts do not seem credible and the charges are extreme. He suggests they may have more to do with China’s recent crackdown on the Christian religion, or possible complaints from North Korea about attempts to help Christians there, or they may be linked to the spying issue.
Tit-for-tat spying accusations?
“The other more or less coincident incident has been the (Canadian) prime minister’s unprecedently strong and explicit statement that it was entities of the Chinese state that were engaged in the cyberattacks against the National Research Council,” says Burton. “You know, it’s a very short period between when the prime minister made that statement and when (Foreign Affairs Minister) Mr. Baird went to engage the Chinese authorities on these very serious concerns, and now the arrest of this Canadian couple on charges of engaging in espionage.
“I daresay that the rhetoric will be the same,” says Burton. “Chinese authorities have rejected outright the possibility that any Chinese state entities were involved in the cyber espionage against the National Research Council, and chances are that we will make a statement of a similar ilk that we don’t see any evidence that Mr. and Mrs. Garrett were in fact military spies.”
Fair trial not likely
The chances of the Garretts having a fair trial are dim, says Burton. Chinese authorities have, in the past, barred Canadian consular officials and the press from the court room. In fact, he says he would not be surprised if the two were tortured to force a confession.
‘Impediment to…Canada-China relations’
“I think this matter is something that the Canadian government will take very seriously and could become quite an impediment to the further development of Canada-China relations,” says Burton. “And the Chinese authorities may not realize how seriously Canadians take the defense of a Canadian citizen who’s being denied justice in a foreign country.”
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