OTTAWA— A friend, a man of honour, a man who “embodies all that is best” about the House of Commons.
That’s how not just party colleagues but even partisan rivals described Conservative MP Michael Chong this week as shock rippled through Parliament with revelations he and his family were targets for Chinese state interference in 2021.
But when Chong himself first heard the news, via a Globe and Mail report last Monday, shock wasn’t what hit him.
In August 2019, two months before the 2019 federal election and two years before the 2021 election, which have both raised major concerns about foreign interference, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau received a report from the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians (NSICOP) that he created in 2017 to advise him on security issues.
Government still investigating why threats against Chong not passed up to cabinet
OTTAWA – The government is still investigating why warnings that a Conservative member of Parliament was being threatened by the Chinese government never made it to the desk of any cabinet minister, Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino said Saturday.
Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the Liberal policy convention in Ottawa, he said the possibility of holding someone accountable for that decision remains “under consideration.”
“It’s important that we unearth their reasons as to why this was not brought directly to the attention of the public safety minister at the time, as well as the prime minister because we take these issues seriously,” he said.
The federal government is under heavy political pressure to expel a foreign diplomat from Canada. Such expulsions are rare — but they do happen.
Earlier this week, the Globe and Mail reported that Zhao Wei, a diplomat at the Chinese consulate in Toronto, was allegedly working on efforts to threaten the family members of Conservative MP Michael Chong.
Junior won’t act without permission from Xi and Canada’s China Class.
One of Pierre Poilievre’s interventions during Wednesday’s question period neatly summed up the balance Conservatives are trying to strike in attacking the Liberal government on foreign interference.
“This is actually not about one member of Parliament,” Poilievre said, referencing allegations that China’s security services targeted MP Michael Chong’s family. “This is about millions of patriotic Canadians of Chinese descent who face this kind of abuse and harassment every single day,”
Sounds like Katie Telford dictated this “Won’t someone think of the Chinese” effort.
Senator says RCMP must release evidence of alleged Chinese police stations in Canada
MONTREAL – A Canadian senator is denouncing the stigmatization of two Montreal-area community organizations that have been accused by the RCMP of hosting secret Chinese government police stations.
Independent Sen. Yuen Pau Woo told reporters today that the RCMP must come forward with evidence against these two groups.
Woo made the comments during a news conference with members of Montreal’s Chinese community at the office of one of the groups targeted by the police, Service à la Famille Chinoise du Grand Montreal.
Can we deport this slimy little prick?
Attempts by two Liberal MPs to throw cold water on claims the Chinese government intimidated relatives of a member of parliament are part of larger efforts by the party to save face by discrediting the accusations, a Conservative MP said on Friday.
The Liberals are such disgusting slimes.
Lawmakers in Ottawa were shocked this month to learn Chinese intelligence had allegedly targeted the Hong Kong-based family of Michael Chong MP, after he criticized Beijing’s human rights record. But for many Chinese, Hong Kong, Uyghur and Tibetan activists in the diaspora, the news came as no surprise.
Chinese security services have long pressured family members of dissidents living overseas. In some cases, the relatives of diaspora or exile activists have been imprisoned in apparent relation for their work.
It’s simply not believable that no one in the political apparatus on Parliament Hill knew about the report on Michael Chong and China’s threats.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says he shared the “best information” he had when he told Canadians a report about a Chinese government plot to target MPs was never shared outside of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service — despite information to the contrary.
But in a news conference Friday, the prime minister refused to answer questions about the source of the communication disconnect in his government.
“I get a briefings regularly from various sources. I’m not going to go into details on that,” he said. “I shared the best information I had at the time both to [Conservative MP Michael] Chong and to Canadians.”
The Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) 2022 report stated that the People’s Republic of China (PRC) is continuing to engage in espionage against Canadian academic institutions, defence contractors, and civil society organizations.
“As a global leader in research and innovation, Canada is a prime target for the PRC’s intangible technology transfer efforts. China targets research through legal, illegal and other unregulated means in order to augment its science and technology sector,” the report states.
CSIS report on MP being targeted by China was sent to PM’s national-security adviser
Contrary to what Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has said, an 2021 intelligence report about an MP being targeted by China was circulated beyond the Canadian Security Intelligence Service and reached the PM’s national-security adviser.
Conservative MP Michael Chong – whose family was being targeted by China – announced in the House of Commons Thursday that Jody Thomas, the national-security adviser, informed him of this in a telephone call.
SHOCKER: MP Michael Chong was told by Trudeau’s own National Security Advisor, Jody Thomas, that the report detailing China’s threats against Chong & his family was circulated beyond CSIS & shared with the Privy Council Office – AKA Trudeau’s department. Trudeau said it wasn’t pic.twitter.com/iCXQMlqR1C
— Brian Lilley (@brianlilley) May 4, 2023
The only donation agreement Alexandre Trudeau ever signed for the Pierre Elliot Trudeau Foundation in his 20 years there is now at the centre of an ethics probe. He doesn’t consider it suspicious.
He is a deceitful ass like his brother.
Mulcair did a good job dissecting the little PR’s testimony.
Canada summons Chinese ambassador over alleged threats to MP Michael Chong
OTTAWA – The Liberal government is summoning China’s ambassador over allegations by Canada’s spy agency that a Chinese diplomat in Toronto was involved in a plot to intimidate a Conservative MP and his family.
Foreign Affairs Minister Melanie Joly said Thursday she asked her deputy minister to tell Chinese Ambassador Cong Peiwu that Canada will not tolerate any form of foreign interference in its affairs.
Joly confirmed media reports that the Canadian Security Intelligence Service believes a diplomat working out of China’s Toronto consulate had targeted Conservative MP Michael Chong and his relatives in Hong Kong, due to his criticism of Beijing’s human-rights record.
“The Chinese community here is frightened by the Chinese government, even though they are in Canada … A lot of Chinese organizations or social groups are very close to the consulate and to the embassy. Why is that? It’s not because they don’t understand the values, or they don’t trust or agree with the values. It’s just because they are so frightened. They know that the Chinese government is so brutal they could do anything.”
If you thought that those words appeared in some news story over the past few days, perhaps in an interview with a Canadian Security and Intelligence Service whistleblower speaking anonymously out of fear of prosecution under the Security of Information Act, you’d have guessed wrong.
