Chinese court upholds death penalty for Canadian Robert Schellenberg

Beijing [China], August 10 (ANI): A Chinese court on Tuesday upheld the death penalty for Canadian Robert Schellenberg for drug smuggling, local media reported.

Schellenberg, who was detained in December 2014, was charged with drug smuggling in January 2015. He was later sentenced to 15 years in prison in 2018. After Schellenberg appealed his original sentence, a provincial court in China retried him and decided on execution in 2019.

Another Canadian, Michael Spavor, detained in late 2018 on suspicion of espionage, is expected to see his verdict announced later this week, Toronto Sun reported. China detained Spavor in December 2018, a few days after Huawei’s Chief Financial Officer Meng Wanzhou was arrested in Vancouver. Along with Spavor, another Canadian national Michael Kovrig was detained. Kovrig is also awaiting a verdict following his trial, which ended in March.

Canadian nationals – former diplomat Kovrig and businessman Spavor – have been in Chinese detention on espionage charges. Ottawa, however, maintains that these are retaliatory measures for Canada’s detention of Meng Wanzhou, who was detained in Vancouver in 2018 at the request of the United States.

Sino-Canadian relations soured after the arrest of Meng and two Canadian nationals in China and have been further exacerbated by Ottawa’s condemnation of Beijing’s national security law implemented in Hong Kong and alleged human rights abuses in Xinjiang province. (ANI)