I was planning to do a deep dive into Global News’ stories on Chinese interference going back to November 2022, to parallel my recent ‘forensic’ examination of the Globe and Mail’s reporting. But the news sped past me. (Maybe, dear reader, you are glad!)
Sam Cooper, for Global News, published on March 22, a stunning set of allegations about a sitting federal Liberal MP, Han Dong. The allegations concern a conversation Han Dong had in February 2021 with the Chinese Consul-General in Toronto, Han Tao, a conversation apparently intercepted by CSIS.
https://globalnews.ca/news/9570437/liberal-mp-han-dong-secretly-advised-chinese-diplomat-in-2021-to-delay-freeing-two-michaels-sources/
To quote Cooper’s sensation-laced opener, Han Dong “advised… that Beijing should hold off freeing Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor.” Why? According to Cooper’s, anonymous intelligence sources, because if the Chinese government released the “two Michaels” Han Dong thought this “would benefit” the Conservatives. Playing banal party politics with the lives of two Canadians would be an unforgiveably grievous action, but how likely is this claim and what evidence is there for it?
The story hangs on some twisted threads. For one, Han Dong’s alleged “advice” to the Chinese diplomat makes no sense, as any ongoing delay in the release of the two Michaels would only hurt the Liberal government and play into the hands of the Conservatives, who were calling for a tougher line against China and arguing that Liberal policies were weak and ineffective. Moreover, Cooper’s sources, in a seemingly contradictory way, also relate that Dong recommended that Beijing “show some progress” in the Kovrig and Spavor cases.
Show some progress by delay???
Han Dong, for his part, doesn’t deny the conversation took place, though he should wish it hadn't. Diplomacy, unsanctioned by your own party, is not the job of junior, backbench MPs. But Dong strenuously denies the allegation that he urged any delay in the release of the two Michaels, saying the opposite is true —that in the conversation with the Chinese consul general he called for their immediate release.
Where are the tapes, dammit? Well, we don’t have access to them and never will. The sources are anonymous and they offered no documentary evidence.
The real story that emerges amidst these claims and counter-claims, concerns CSIS’s effort to understand what Han Dong was up to and to decide how to respond. In my reading of the very scant “evidence,” this is a classic tale of the uncertainties of intelligence, and appropriate sensitivities about stepping into political dog shit.
The Service had been concerned about Han Dong’s interactions with the Chinese consul-general for some time, at least according to earlier reporting by Cooper, again based on anonymous sources. These sources told Cooper that it was suspected from the moment that Han Dong made a move into federal politics, that he was too friendly with the Chinese consul-general, was a preferred Beijing candidate in 2019, and that there were irregularities in his nomination process that pointed to Chinese state interference. There were even concerns that China was behind a disinformation campaign against his Liberal nomination rival. According to Cooper’s anonymous sources, CSIS worries about Dong mounted to the point where they briefed PMO and urged the Liberals to rescind his candidacy back in 2019. Nothing doing.
https://globalnews.ca/news/9504291/liberals-csis-warning-2019-election-candidate-chinese-interference/
Fast forward to 2021. Dong is now a twice-elected MP. He is still on CSIS’s radar. The Service struggled to assess his interactions with the Chinese consul-general. Was he operating a “back channel?” Was it sanctioned by someone high up in the Canadian government? Did he have the right as an MP, with special access to the Chinese consul general, to discuss significant issues in relations between the two countries at a time when they were bottoming out? What kind of spin was Dong putting on these issues, including those involving human rights? (CSIS couldn’t be sure that they were capturing all the interactions between these two and maybe the communications intercepts were incomplete or difficult to translate—these things happen.)
At the same time, CSIS investigators wondered whether Han Dong had actually been helpful in encouraging the Chinese regime to “show some progress” with the case of the two Michaels. Maybe he had done some good?
How should CSIS officials operating in the trenches convey these uncertainties to their seniors, with all the sensitivity that surrounds an investigation that touches on an elected member of Parliament? Big question. All we know from Cooper’s account and his sources is that CSIS “management” was briefed.
In the face of this media story, Han Dong has left the Liberal caucus, is now sitting as an independent, and says that he is determined to clear his name. He claims he has faced “hateful comments” and even “death threats.”
The opposition Conservatives are demanding in the House of Commons to know what Trudeau knew. In their minds the story laces in to larger claims that Chinese interference caused the loss of Conservative seats in the 2021 election (though they don’t claim it changed the overall election result) and that the Trudeau government winked at a Beijing interference campaign that favoured it.
Here’s question period, if you can bear it:
https://www.cpac.ca/question-period
How does the Han Dong story end? (I already gave away the ending)
It ends very badly.
There are two broad outcomes. One is that the allegations are proven true in some way. That ends the political career of Han Dong, undermines trust in governance, casts a dark shadow of mistrust-by-association, deeply unwarranted, over all Chinese Canadians in political office at all levels of government, fuels potential racist and xenophobic attitudes on the margins of Canadian society, and opens up a broad avenue for mischief by foreign powers seeking to amplify political strife in Canada.
The other outcome is that the allegations prove unfounded. Mr. Dong clears his name, the mud is somehow wiped away, and the news cycle moves on. That strikes a blow to an already declining faith in mainstream media reporting, and in concepts of journalistic rigour and ethics. It makes a mockery of our democratic politics. Authoritarian regimes love this stuff. History records it.
In a story that broke after the Cooper account, the Globe and Mail reports that PMO and its “National Security office” asked CSIS for a transcript of the intercepted conversation earlier this month, following a Globe query about the 2021 meeting between Dong and the Chinese consul-general. According to a Globe source, a review of the transcript found no actionable evidence and nothing to conclude that Han Dong had sought a delay in the release of the two Michaels. Maybe that tilts the story towards “unfounded.”
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/politics/article-csis-han-dong-allegations/
Whichever bad ending is to be faced, there is another certainty. A hunt is on to uncover the leakers and to put a stop to the leaks. An effort to identify the culprits is both inevitable and necessary, irrespective of whether they acted in the national interest. It is not a cover-up, except in the literal sense, to pull a cover back over secrets, some of which rightly deserve protection from unauthorized disclosure. Such hunts do great damage in their own right. They turn national security agencies inside out. They interfere with ongoing operations, cast suspicions in every direction (spy catchers are the ultimate paranoiacs), damage morale, weaken trust, and undermine Canada’s ally-worthiness among key intelligence partners.
One other thing, politicians hate intelligence scandals. It turns them away from the idea that they need the insights and advice that intelligence provides. Safer to look elsewhere. The usual recourse is to their own sense that they know better anyway.
The leakers may believe they have struck a blow in the public interest; but they have also struck another blow, which may accrue to our cost in the future, as we face worsening foreign state interference threats. They have weakened, through public exposure, Canada’s surveillance and communications interception capabilities against foreign adversaries, by putting them on the alert.
This is a high price, and one that was not likely calculated by the leakers when they set out on their chosen course.
Bad endings, all around.
I'm glad you said the hunt is on for the leakers, because I've been wondering about that. If their (if there's more than one) identity becomes public, chances are that a lot of the mystique around motivation would collapse. But on this alone, CSIS, or whatever service is in charge of looking for them, is not looking competent. It's been going on for months. How hard could it be? There's clues in the opinion piece alone.
In fact, CSIS isn't looking at all good, in general (I don't know if anyone has actually said it's someone from CSIS, but on political panel shows tonight they weren't bothering to make a distinction.) Do you think this could be a shake-up for CSIS internally, along the lines of MI-6 after Kim Philby, or the CIA after their spies?
It's very disturbing to me how little historical context is given in the broad coverage (although you did write that wonderful piece about the Maher Arar debacle, and Chantal Hebert mentioned the episode as well.) I remember the period after 9-11 very well, especially when Maher Arar was arrested and his wife was struggling to get heard, and the reporting about him was so murky. From the first, her task was so daunting. Those days still haunt governments, I hope.