Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou’s arrest is a reminder to global companies that the US means business on sanctions

Richard Ip and Vadim Nikitin say while the popular narrative is that Meng Wanzhou was targeted as part of the trade war, the US Department of Justice’s activism may have been par for the course

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Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou, photographed here at a session of an investment forum in Moscow in October 2014, was detained in Canada on December 1 at the request of the US government. Photo: Reuters

Richard IpandVadim Nikitin

Published: 3:00am, 15 Dec 2018Updated: 1:45pm, 16 Dec 2018

Huawei chief financial officer Sabrina Meng Wanzhou wiped away tears on Tuesday as she was granted US$7.5 million bail by a Canadian judge. Yet the relief is only temporary: on February 6, the court will reconvene to decide whether she will be extradited to the US and face the possibility of decades in prison.

Immediately after Meng’s detention on December 1, speculation turned to politics. Given the Trump administration’s adversarial approach to Beijing, it’s understandable that her arrest would be seen through the lens of an increasingly fraught US-China relationship.

Yet, often overlooked in the media frenzy is the alleged transgression believed to be behind Meng’s arrest: a violation of sanctions against Iran. She stands accused of hiding the relationship between Huawei and SkyCom, a company that did business in Iran. There is a widespread sense – fanned by sensationalist media reports – that, while the case is ostensibly about sanctions, the true issue is Huawei’s commercial clout and links to Chinese security services.