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Image source,Reuters
On December 7 Canadian time, Meng Wanzhou returned to court again to attend the hearing. Previously, there were reports that the US Department of Justice was discussing the possibility of a plea deal with Meng Wanzhou.
In return, she will be returned to China after pleading guilty, provided she admits to any wrongdoing.
A plea deal raises many questions. For example, when Meng Wanzhou faced Canadian prosecutors in Canadian court, why did he settle with the United States Department of Justice? For another example, if Meng Wanzhou admits part of the allegations, what will the impact be on Huawei? And if Meng Wanzhou rejects the deal, how will the case end?
BBC Chinese interviewed legal experts to answer these questions one by one.
Legally speaking, what is a plea agreement?
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“From the perspective of the people in civil law countries (like China), the plea deal is difficult to understand. If you are guilty, you must be punished and if you are not guilty, you must be released. There is no negotiation.” The practice is particularly common, especially in the United States.
Wang Jiangyu introduced that the US court system handles a large number of cases each year, and court trials are extremely long and expensive. If all cases are heard in court, time, manpower, and financial resources are difficult to back up, so the plea agreement provides a mechanism for the defendant to admit guilt in exchange for a lighter punishment .
“You may have seen the prosecutor tell the defendant that he could have been sentenced to ten years, but now he is only allowed to serve eight years and will no longer go to court. Defendant’s attorneys can negotiate and ask, three Years not it’s good, five years. The two parties reached an agreement, the defendant reduced the sentence and the entire legal system saved costs. “
Meng Wanzhou faced that choice. The United States Department of Justice presented more attractive conditions, such as not having to serve the sentence and returning to China immediately in exchange for Meng Wanzhou admitting certain accusations, ending this two-year case.
Since 2004, the US judicial department began to adopt the Deferred Prosecution Agreement (DPA) and the Non-Prosecution Agreement (NPA). According to current disclosures, the US Department of Justice proposed to Meng Wanzhou the DPA, that is, the Delayed Prosecution Agreement.
Delaying the prosecution agreement is not waiving follow-up, which means that in the future it is still possible to be prosecuted in the same case. Additionally, conditions will be attached to the agreement, such as requiring the defendant to cooperate when prosecuted again; otherwise, it will be considered as new guilt or require that the accused not participate in certain types of activities.
Why negotiate a settlement with the US Department of Justice? What role does Canada play?
Image source,fake images
Canadian citizens Kovrig (right) and Spaffer (left) were arrested in China in late 2018.
Meng Wanzhou was arrested by the RCMP at the Canadian airport and appeared before a Canadian court, and also faced the Canadian prosecutor. Why is the US Department of Justice trying to settle with Meng Wanzhou?
Wang Jiangyu explained that Canadian courts are not hearing Meng Wanzhou’s case itself, but whether Meng Wanzhou complies with the extradition agreement between the United States and Canada. The final decision is only whether to extradite or not.
“Meng Wanzhou’s arrest and trial in Canada are based on allegations made by the US Department of Justice. If Meng Wanzhou and the US Department of Justice reach a plea agreement, this The latter will withdraw the extradition request. The Canadian courts do not need to continue the trial. Free people. “
It is worth noting that Canada’s relations with China deteriorated dramatically due to the Meng Wanzhou case. Two Canadian citizens, Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor, are currently detained in Beijing.
The United States tried to handle the case out of court, which made Canada’s role even more embarrassing.
Canada was silent on a possible agreement between the two parties. Prime Minister Trudeau declined to comment on Friday, saying his priority is getting two Canadian citizens detained in China back home.
However, Guy Saint-Jacques, Canada’s former ambassador to China, said: “Hopefully the relevant discussions are serious and a solution can be found, otherwise I think we will be in long-term embarrassment.”
The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation also quoted Vancouver lawyer Richard Kurland as saying that this news could help American and Canadian politicians assess the public’s water temperature. If an overwhelming public opinion supports the termination of the case, the state governments The United States and Canada will be more motivated to reach an agreement. Get away.
But as far as Canada is concerned, even if a plea deal is reached and made public, it won’t necessarily repair relations with China. Wang Jiangyu believes that the United States and Meng Wanzhou have reached an agreement that Canada should free people. China considers the arrest of people a political crime. However, China will not be pleased with the release of people. It is based solely on the nature of the American court process. as a result of.
If a plea deal is reached, what impact will it have on Huawei?
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News broke that the United States and Meng Wanzhou discussed a plea deal. Chinese officials did not express a “welcome” but referred to it as a “cheat”.
Hua Chunying, a spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry, said seeing the report is exactly the same as the plot in “American Trap” written by French Alstom executives.
In 2013, French Alstom executive Frédéric Pierucci was arrested by the FBI in New York and charged with commercial bribery. Since then, several Alstom executives have reached a plea deal with the United States, their confessions turned into evidence, and the court fined Alstom $ 772 million. At the same time, Alstom’s energy business was also acquired by its US rival General Electric.
If Meng Wanzhou reaches a plea deal, will Huawei be implicated?
Critic Deng Yuwen previously told the BBC that if Meng Wanzhou pleaded guilty, the substantive effect the United States was pursuing would not be weakened, because this would give other Western countries more reasons to exclude Huawei.
“There are all possibilities, mainly depending on the terms of the plea deal.” Wang Jiangyu said that if he only admitted that the information provided to HSBC was incomplete, it may not affect Huawei; But if Meng Wanzhou is required to provide new evidence, Huawei’s global operations may be restricted, which is another matter.
Judging by current reports, Meng Wanzhou is not keen on reaching a plea deal with the United States. The reason may be that the terms of the deal will further affect Huawei, or Meng Wanzhou and his lawyers are confident that the Canadian court will reject the extradition request.
Why is the United States now proposing a plea deal?
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The United States believes that Huawei poses a threat to the national security of the United States, and Huawei has always denied this.
“In response to this problem, we can only make reasonable guesses based on the general environment.” Wang Jiangyu said that this is a highly politicized case. Trump has repeatedly stated that the Meng case can provide a bargaining chip for trade negotiations between China and the United States, and related Twitter including Becoming Meng Wanzhou’s lawyer proves the case was politically motivated. Political interests and political will are needed behind political cases.
But after the US elections, the White House will change hands on January 20 of next year. In Wang Jiangyu’s view, the new President Biden will not do his best to promote the Meng Wanzhou case for two reasons: First, as a traditional liberal politician, he believes that international competition in this way is too low and does not adjusts to their style of doing things; Even if he worked hard to advance the Meng case and achieved results, he would be counted on Trump’s credit.
Zheng Anguang, vice dean of the Nanjing University Institute of International Relations, also expressed similar views to the media. He believes that the Meng Wanzhou incident is a political incident, and Bi might consider dropping the charges against Meng Wanzhou after he takes office.
Therefore, the current Department of Justice under the Trump administration is motivated to hear the case in little more than a month.
The latest court file on December 7th showed that the Royal Canadian Mounted Police stationed at Vancouver Airport Sheriff Randy (Ross Lundie) testified: “I am not providing information or taking action on behalf of the FBI anyway. Working as the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) and helping the FBI, in my capacity, will be a very uncomfortable situation. “
In addition, Canadian prosecutors representing the United States are growing weaker in court. There is no strong evidence, except for a PPT between Meng Wanzhou and HSBC, and Meng’s lawyers are concerned about the political nature of the case and the abuse of Canadian police procedures. Desperately pursuing them. “Wang Jiangyu believes that Canada’s position is even more shameful when the case drags into the Biden era. The possible outcome is that the Canadian court, seeing the political nature of the case, rejected the extradition request of United States.
