Biography
Meng Wanzhou, the chief financial officer and deputy chair of the board of Chinese tech giant Huawei, was imprisoned in Canada in 2018 on a U.S. extradition request. The warrant was based on allegations that Wanzhou had cleared money that was claimed to be for Huawei, but was actually for Skycom, an entity claimed to be entirely controlled by Huawei, which was said to be dealing with Iran, contrary to sanctions. She was accused of misleading British bank HSBC over its business dealings in Iran, thereby violating its illegal unilateral sanctions. The allegations were rejected by Meng's defence lawyer, who claimed she did not break any U.S. or Canadian laws and that the US had deliberately omitted key information on two PowerPoint slides that had showed that Meng was upfront to HSBC about the true nature of Skycom/Huawei relationship.
Meng's lawyers made several allegations against the prosecution, including allegations of unlawful detention. Meng was released in September 2021 after spending more than 1,000 days under house arrest in the city as part of her bail condition. On December 2, 2022, all charges were dismissed at the request of the U.S. government.
