Huawei founder Ren Zhengfei, who on Monday gave his first ever international broadcast interview, described the arrest of his daughter Meng Wanzhou, who is also Huawei’s CFO, as “politically motivated.”
Meng was arrested in Canada on December 1st at the request of the United States, which is pursuing multiple criminal charges against Huawei and its CFO, including money laundering, bank fraud and stealing trade secrets, and violating sanction agreements against Iran. Canadian legal authorities have yet to decide whether to extradite Meng to the United States.
Ren told BBC in this interview that he objects to this politically motivated act but will let the courts settle it.
Canada, which confirmed late January that it had received a formal extradition request from the US has until March 1st to make a decision.
The US Justice Department has denied that the arrest was a political act.
The Chinese telco giant Huawei, considered to be a leader in 5G technology, found itself drawn into the China-US trade war. The US and other countries are boycotting the firm’s technology over fears that it could be misused to spy for the Chinese government.
