Canadian Court Rules Upcoming Extradition Trial of Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou Cannot Be Televised

The upcoming trial of Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou won’t be televised.

A Canadian judge has rejected a request by media organizations to televise Huawei Meng Wanzhou’s extradition hearing next week, saying that doing so could influence witnesses and jurors at any potential trial in the United States, reads a new report from Reuters.

“Broadcasts would almost inevitably reach the community of the trial, given the high profile of this case in Canada and abroad, the political commentary relating to the case, and the sensationalized nature of some of the media coverage,” Justice Heather Holmes said in a ruling released late on Monday.

“This is because of the well-known power of audio-visual representation, as well as because of the increased authenticity flowing from an apparent reproduction of courtroom proceedings,” Holmes said.



“Similarly, broadcasting sound bites out of context would detract from the public understanding of the proceedings, and therefore their transparency, and for this and other reasons would undermine the dignity of the proceedings.”

The formal case to determine whether to allow the US’ request to extradite Meng, Huawei’s chief financial officer — who was arrested in December 2018, on a flight stopover in Vancouver — will begin next Monday after months of preliminary hearings.

Meng is accused of defrauding HSBC by allegedly misleading it about Huawei’s relationship to a firm that was doing business in Iran, to reassure the bank that it was not in breach of US sanctions on Iran by doing business with the Chinese telecoms company.