Evidence of meeting #15 for Canada-China Relations in the 44th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was interference.
A video is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Tom Kmiec Conservative Calgary Shepard, AB
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I just want to give Safeguard Defenders credit. I think a lot of the reason we're all here is the reports you've been putting out recently.
In November 2022, there was that update report. It mentioned that Ireland and the Netherlands have directed that these police stations be closed. Has any other government closed these stations?
Campaign Director, Fundacion Safeguard Defenders
I would have to go back. There are some others that gave an order to close—for example the Czech Republic.
To be honest, we don't believe this is a full response. Ireland, for example, has not officially announced investigations, whereas the Netherlands has.
That's one reason why I said that we do commend the response so far by the RCMP on the issue of the police stations. They've been quite open about investigating, which I think is more important than just saying that they'll close a specific address, given that the organizations underneath will just keep running.
Conservative
Tom Kmiec Conservative Calgary Shepard, AB
The report also mentioned that 14 countries had launched investigations. Are there any new countries that have begun investigations?
Campaign Director, Fundacion Safeguard Defenders
Some more countries have announced investigations. Not all of them are very open on the extent to which they are doing that.
Conservative
Tom Kmiec Conservative Calgary Shepard, AB
The PRC's United Front Work Department websites say that these are volunteers who work there. Some of the pictures provided by your organization, and online, show uniformed officers doing joint patrols in Italy.
Are these volunteers or are these employees?
Campaign Director, Fundacion Safeguard Defenders
Those police officers in Italy were part of the joint police patrols. That was an agreement that Italy made with the Ministry of Public Security. It's an agreement that is still in place, although the execution of it is suspended because of COVID—not because of the police stations. Those were officials from the police in China. They are not the people manning the stations.
We're not sure, at this point in time, if the people linked to these stations are acting in a voluntary capacity or are hired. We've seen language about these people being hired by the public security authorities in China, but we have no evidence of payments being made. That's an open question.
Conservative
Tom Kmiec Conservative Calgary Shepard, AB
In the Canadian case, do you have information about these people? Are they Canadian citizens or permanent residents who are being hired or who are volunteering to work? Are these people coming from outside the country and working or volunteering for these police stations?
Campaign Director, Fundacion Safeguard Defenders
It's our impression so far from all over the world that the vast majority of these people are regular residents in the country where these stations are operated.
Again, the United Front link is important. One reason they've been getting away with this with such impunity is that these people have been engaged in influence operations for a long time. Usually, they're well established within those communities and have ties. We see regular photo ops with local politicians, academics, business men and so on.
Conservative
Tom Kmiec Conservative Calgary Shepard, AB
Does your organization support the creation of a foreign agent registry act?
Campaign Director, Fundacion Safeguard Defenders
I guess we would support that. Do I think that is a solution to the issue? No. It might be a start.
Let's be honest: These people are not going to register as foreign agents.
Conservative
Tom Kmiec Conservative Calgary Shepard, AB
Would you support a foreign agent registry act that applies to all countries equally, rather than one specific to the PRC?
Conservative
Tom Kmiec Conservative Calgary Shepard, AB
Okay.
To Professor Leuprecht, through you, Mr. Chair, I wanted to ask if you support the creation of a foreign agent registry act.
Professor, Royal Military College of Canada, As an Individual
I have called for that publicly and in writing, repeatedly, along with other measures. Yes.
Conservative
Tom Kmiec Conservative Calgary Shepard, AB
I needed you to say it on the record. Thank you for doing that.
I'm going to ask you for some conjecture here because you're an expert on this.
Is it possible that Canada's non-invitation to AUKUS is related to the amount of successful interference in civic society in Canada?
Professor, Royal Military College of Canada, As an Individual
That is difficult to gauge. It appears that this is more an elite process, on the one hand, of Canada's being left out of key conversations and, on the other hand, some Canadian elites having chosen not to participate in those conversations.
Conservative
Tom Kmiec Conservative Calgary Shepard, AB
On a foreign agent registry act, in order to identify the persons and organizations that should be on there, how much outreach should we be doing to diaspora communities in Canada that targeted by these organizations?
Professor, Royal Military College of Canada, As an Individual
I think we have some pretty effective models from both Australia and the United Kingdom on how we can effectively operationalize a foreign registry act. I'm not sure why it takes us years of consultations. Yes, we need to make it commensurable with the charter, unlike the U.K. and Australia, but I don't think this is all that difficult to do.
Conservative
Tom Kmiec Conservative Calgary Shepard, AB
Professor Chantal, do you agree on creating a registry of foreign agents in Canada?
Associate Professor of Political Science, Université de Moncton, As an Individual
I don't know whether that would provide a solution to the problem, but if a registry like that were considered to be useful, then that would be fine.
If you would allow me a few seconds now, I would like to say that the problem is much more complex. Chinese nationals who are supposed to be part of this strategy on the part of mainland China may be forced to participate in it, but there are also Canadian citizens of Chinese descent who are living here, or American citizens of Chinese descent, who identify, one way or another, with mainland China and may willingly participate in the objectives of the Chinese Communist Party.
It would therefore be difficult to put that kind of registry in place, in that these are much more open liberal democratic societies that consequently respect individual liberties.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ken Hardie
Thank you very much.
We've been a little generous with time tonight. We do have a little bit of a pad leading up to the top of the hour, but, henceforth, to make sure everybody gets a fair shot, after this round, we'll start to hold you to your time.
Mr. Oliphant you have five minutes or a little bit.
Liberal
Rob Oliphant Liberal Don Valley West, ON
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
I want to thank all of the witnesses. You're here tonight as experts, and it is very important to us to get your testimony.
This committee will most likely engage in writing a report following this study, and when we get into that closed-door, in camera session, we look at the testimony that you have given us. That is how it gets into the report. I for one will always try to ensure that it's substantiated testimony and actually based in fact, not just opinion. With that, I want to talk to Professor Leuprecht to ask a few questions.
In your testimony tonight, you said that international organizations are being suborned by the PRC to the detriment of Canada's interests. Can you name those and show us exactly how that is happening?
Professor, Royal Military College of Canada, As an Individual
Yes, one good example is the World Health Organization. Chinese influence and interference in the World Health Organization has been publicly documented since 1953. Those of us who understand how the organization works knew from the beginning that intelligence coming out of the World Health Organization with regard to the pandemic should be taken with a grain of salt. If we had done that, I think our countries would have reacted differently.
Liberal
Rob Oliphant Liberal Don Valley West, ON
If you have others, we would be happy to receive them in writing.
You mentioned the balloons, which seemed to be a throwaway comment or rhetoric, or is there something you wanted to add about balloons to this testimony, in your expert opinion?
Professor, Royal Military College of Canada, As an Individual
You might have seen my opinion piece in The Globe and Mail on this. The balloons were effectively a test of NORAD's response system to objects in our airspace. What better way to understand how we respond and the characteristics of our response than to send different objects of different sizes?