Dong Guangping in two minutes.... Dong Guangping is an incredible Chinese human rights defender who has been imprisoned three times in China because of his advocacy, a lot of which has been related to Tiananmen Square.
He and his wife and daughter escaped from China in 2015. He almost made it to Canada at the time. He was accepted for refugee resettlement, but where they were in hiding, the Thai government unfortunately handed him over to Chinese officials just days before he was to fly to Canada. He was sent back to China and imprisoned again. He was then released from that third period of imprisonment. He was determined to once again find his way to freedom, especially given that his wife and daughter were now here in Canada. Obviously, he wanted to be with them.
His first incredible attempt was to actually swim to freedom. He tried to swim off the coast of China to reach an offshore island controlled by Taiwan. He almost drowned. He didn't make it. He was rescued by a fishing boat and taken back to China. He tried another time, that time going overland to Vietnam, where he remained in hiding for two and half years—enduring COVID, for instance—concerned about not coming to the attention of Vietnamese officials, while the Canadian government carefully tried to see what they could do to encourage Vietnam to let him leave the country and come to Canada.
Unfortunately, on August 24 of last year, seven months ago, while it looked like his departure for Canada was drawing closer, he was arrested by Vietnamese police. There has been no word of him since.
To connect it up with Bill C-281, I think the family—and certainly advocates—have very much welcomed Canada's involvement in trying to advocate on his behalf. In particular, Prime Minister Trudeau and Minister Joly raised it at high levels back in the fall when they were in Southeast Asia for a number of summits, but beyond that, it's been very difficult for the family to have any clarity as to what is or is not being done.
There are assurances that it's being taken up, but there's never any reporting as to what that looks like and no indication as to what the results are or the outcome is. I think it really leaves the family very much in the dark. It's one of the reasons why I emphasize that the bill could be significantly strengthened if it paid attention to that side of this. How do we ensure that family members and advocates get more reliable information?