China imposes death penalty on Canadian

A Chinese court has imposed the death penalty on a Canadian man found guilty of trying to smuggle ice to Australia.

Robert Lloyd Schellenberg in court in Dalian on Monday. Picture: AFP

Tensions between Canada and China yesterday escalated following the death penalty handed out by a Chinese court to a Canadian found guilty of trying to smuggle ice to Australia.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau expressed his ­“extreme concern” that China chose to “arbitrarily” impose the death penalty on a Canadian citizen. Mr Trudeau said Canada was prepared to intervene on Robert Lloyd Schellenberg’s behalf.

The Canadian government also issued a warning to its citizens about the “risk of arbitrary enforcement of local laws” in China.

“We encourage Canadians to exercise a high degree of caution in China due to the risk of arbitrary enforcement of local laws,” said the warning.

Schellenberg, who has faced drug trafficking charges in Canada, was arrested in China on November 19, 2014, and sentenced fours years later on November 20 to 15 years in prison for trying to smuggle methamphetamine (ice).

Following an appeal, a high court in Liaoning on December 29 ruled the sentence did not fit the severity of his crimes and ordered a new trial. A day later, the Dalian procuratorate “supplied supplementary evidences” against Schellenberg.

On Monday night after his retrial at the Dalian Intermediate People’s Court, the 36-year-old was given the death penalty for being the mastermind of a four-member international syndicate that planned to smuggle more than 222kg of methamphetamine from a warehouse in the port city to Australia in pellets stuffed inside car tyres.

The sudden retrial has raised speculation it is retaliation for Canada’s arrest on December 1 of Meng Wanzhou, the chief financial officer of telecommunications giant Huawei, as she passed through Vancouver airport, to face charges in the US of violating sanctions against Iran.

After Ms Meng’s arrest, China arrested two Canadians — a ­former diplomat working for a ­European not-for-profit group, Michael Kovrig, and Michael Spaver, a businessman with ties to North Korea — on suspicion of endangering national security.

A Canadian teacher was also detained for allegedly violating her work visa in China but was later released and returned home.

The Chinese government took the unusual step of inviting foreign media to attend Schellenberg’s retrial, prompting specu­lation that authorities were using the case to put pressure on Canada to release Ms Meng, who is now on bail and set to return to a Vancouver court on February 6.

According to a statement released by the court, Schellenberg and several Chinese in late 2014 planned to rent a warehouse in Dalian. Schellenberg asked another Chinese man, Xu Qing, to order the tyres. Xu reported Schellenberg to police.

Schellenberg boarded a flight to Thailand but was arrested during a stopover in Guangdong.

Dalian police seized 222 pack­ages — weighing a 1kg each — of methamphetamine.

Schellenberg, who said at his retrial that he had been framed, has 10 days to appeal his sentence. His lawyer said the prosecution had not produced new evidence that justified changing his 15-year sentence to the death penalty.

China executed at least 19 foreigners for drug smuggling between 2009 and 2015, according to the San Francisco-based Dui Hua Foundation.

Several lawyers in China have pointed out that the case is unusual as sentences handed out after an appeal are traditionally lighter than the original.

“It is clearly stated in law that no more severe punishment should be given after appeal, otherwise the function of supervision and correction of the appeal will be damaged,” Chen Youxi, a lawyer in Shanghai, wrote on ­social media.

Human Rights Watch executive director Kenneth Roth said Schellenberg’s retrial was “playing hostage to politics”.

He said China had rushed “the retrial of a Canadian suspect in a fairly transparent attempt to pressure Canada to free” Ms Meng.