How the Two Michaels’ freedom was won
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Summary
The case of Michael Spavor and Michael Kovrig has been one of the most talked about stories of recent years. They have been released from prison in China, but have yet to speak publicly about their ordeal. Two men who have written extensively about this are Mike Blanchfield and Fenn Osler-Hampson.
Transcript
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Collectively, they're known as the two Michaels, and quite frankly, most of the time that people
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talk about them, they don't mention their last names. I'm speaking, of course, about Michael Spavor,
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an entrepreneur, Michael Kovrig, peace advocate, both arrested in China about four years ago for
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allegations of spying. Will we ever really know the full story of these two gentlemen? Have we heard it
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yet? They haven't said a lot since returning from their exile, their imprisonment in China just over
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about a year ago. They appeared recently at Joe Biden's dinner and his address to Parliament. But other
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than that, we haven't heard much. Two men who've written extensively about this are Mike Blanchfield
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and Fenn Osler-Hampson. And before we get to them, I just want to remind you that you can subscribe
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to Full Comment Podcast. Hello, I'm Brian Lilly, your host. You can subscribe to it anywhere that you
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listen to podcasts, Stitcher, Apple, Google, Spotify, what have you. Make sure you hit subscribe. Make
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sure you leave a comment, a like, share it on social media, and help get the word out. Now, the story of
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the two Michaels fascinated me while they were in jail, because I can't imagine what it was like for them
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and the conditions they were living in. I can't imagine how difficult it was for Canadian officials
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trying to deal with this very international and complex story. That's what we want to talk to Blanchfield
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and Fenn Osler-Hampson about. Mike Blanchfield, longtime journalist with the Canadian Press,
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now with Blue Sky Strategy. Fenn Osler-Hampson is a professor at Carleton University, president of
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the World Refugee and Migration Council. They both join us from Ottawa. Gentlemen, good to speak to you
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both again. Good afternoon, Brian. I want to ask you, do you think that based on what you've written,
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based on what we've seen in the media over the last several years, will we ever know the full story
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of why they in particular were arrested and what happened to them? Well, I'll weigh in on that a
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little bit, if I may. I mean, we probably will learn more in the coming years, because I think
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Michael Kovrig, while he was in prison, and it's talked about in our book as well, was really eager to
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re-engage with the world and get out and get his freedom, obviously. He is a pretty accomplished
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writer as a government employee at Foreign Affairs, and then as an analyst for the International Crisis
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Group, which is the organization he was working with when he was abducted. And I think we're going
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to probably hear from him at some point on his experience on what really happened, because he's
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really the only one who can tell it. As for Michael Spavor, he went to ground very early on in the
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week after his imprisonment, where Global Affairs Canada put out a statement, a short one or two
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line statement, on behalf of the family, with a photo of Mr. Spavor with a dog saying, basically,
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just wants some private time and wants to re-engage with his life, and frankly, who can blame him?
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And so, I mean, we, in our book, Fenn and I, I think we set the stage on how it happened,
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why it happened, and we literally stopped writing the moment they got out of prison
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and returned to Canada. So, but I agree that there's probably other chapters to be written,
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but I think they'll be written by the people who were in the middle of this, the two Michaels
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themselves, perhaps one of them, maybe both of them.
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Michael, let me stay with you. You and I, when we were both on Parliament Hill, I can't
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count how many family members were imprisoned in various countries, and you would constantly
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have family still in Canada, you know, coming to the media, coming to the government, saying,
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you've got to tell their story, you've got to talk about them, here's what's going on.
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We didn't have that with the two Michaels. In fact, it was very difficult to get their family
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members to speak. How much access did you have to family members in, in writing the book, either of
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The Spauver family kept a very low profile, it was deliberate. And as I've told other people,
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if it was my brother in prison like this, I probably would do the same thing. I wouldn't
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be talking to people like you or me either. But Kovrig's wife at the time, Vina,
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Najibullah decided to go public about a year or so after he was in prison. She went on the CBC.
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She made herself available for interviews. I interviewed her a number of times over the
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course of covering the story and including a lot of that material in the book. She made
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herself available to the International Crisis Group that did a podcast and interviewed her
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in depth on her experiences. And so she created a very strong narrative portrait of what
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Michael Kovrig was enduring. So we learned a bit about that. We know that both men had quite
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a reading list of material, but it seems that from what we understand, I think Fennell probably
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agrees. I think the two families kind of turned to Vina as their spokesperson, their champions
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to get this, to kind of keep the story alive. And as their imprisonment crew, it just seemed
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like it was going to take a lot more to keep this in sort of the public eye. And that was
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sort of the reasons why we decided to write the book in the first place was to remind people
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in case they just started lingering in prison without a lot of attention.
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Fen, let me ask you, were these two Canadians, I mean, we know the backstory that they were
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arrested in retaliation for Canada detaining Men Wazoo. But was this just a case of unfortunate
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circumstances for two Canadians in a very complex geopolitical game of war?
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Brian, I would say that both Spavor and Kovrig were clearly in the line sights of Chinese intelligence
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and security officials. Spavor, because of the work he had done previously and continued
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to do in North Korea, based from his base in China. And Michael Kovrig, being a former diplomat
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working for a very high profile human rights organization, the International Crisis Group,
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he was there on secondment. And so their activities, and I think it's fair to say, you know,
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Michael Kovrig is high visibility. And, you know, they were being watched. The really interesting
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question, Brian, is why did the Chinese go after two Canadians when they could have easily arrested
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American businessmen or business persons in China? There are lots of Americans in China.
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Because the warrant for Meng was issued in New York court by the U.S. Department of Justice.
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And I think, you know, the interesting question there is, you know, why didn't they go after an American?
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Why did they go after, you know, two Canadians? And I think...
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Well, I think it's because they were worried if they went after two Americans, this would be escalating
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the situation. And so they remember when the announcement of the arrest came. It came just as
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the G20 summit was taking place in Buenos Aires. Donald Trump had just had a great dinner with
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the president of China, Xi Jinping. Prime Minister Trudeau was also at that dinner. There was a lot of talk
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at the dinner table about turning the page on the trade dispute that the United States had with
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China. And then this arrest takes place. And it's done while Xi Jinping is on the world stage.
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And this was seen as a personal affront to Xi Jinping, given the high-profile nature of Meng Wanzhou.
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And so that turned it into, you know, what we would call a global embarrassment for the Chinese.
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And so the officials around Xi Jinping, you know, their boss was probably pretty upset about this.
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And they would have said, well, we got to do something about it. Let's go after the Canadians.
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They, after all, and this is a Chinese term of derision, they use against Canada, wear the lapdogs.
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And so that's, that's how this happened. And the fact that Kovrig was a former, he was actually on
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secondment. So he was still technically in the employment of the Canadian government as a, as a
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diplomat. So, you know, they decided to go after these two guys.
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Was that, was that a mistake on our part that they were allowed to be arrested or Meng Wanzhou was
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allowed to be arrested while this high-profile international dinner is going on? And they're
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Well, the, the timing, you know, the, the timing was, was, was really bad from, from, from that
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standpoint, obviously. I think it was a confluence of circumstances. I mean, Meng Wanzhou could have
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been, they were watching her movements where she was traveling. The, the arrest warrant had been
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delivered in August, uh, 2018. So, um, you know, the, uh, uh, the, the actual arrest took place on the
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1st of December. Uh, so, you know, for, for those two months, they were seeing where she was going.
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She was traveling around the world. Um, and, you know, to be honest, I think the American, uh, authorities
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felt, uh, more confident that, um, the Canadians would actually honor, uh, uh, an extradition request
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as opposed to, she'd been in, I think, France. You can correct me, Mike. She'd been in France, uh, uh,
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earlier, uh, uh, she'd been to a whole string of countries in that sort of intervening period.
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And, uh, yeah, as Fenn is explaining, she could have been picked up elsewhere. I think, um, for the
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Americans, I think they realized they had an ironclad agreement with Canada. We're a security partner.
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We're a neighbor, and they could count on us to, uh, honor a treaty, which is what a lot of people
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argued. We should have done, despite the fact that had horrible ramifications for these two people,
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other, other politics, ex-politicians like John Manley, a former foreign minister has argued,
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uh, we should have botched the job strategically and let her get away to let her go on to Mexico,
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which is where she was headed to do. Yeah. And just basically, you know, sidestep it. And then
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this wouldn't have happened, uh, to Canada. There wouldn't have, we wouldn't receive this blowback,
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but that became sort of the central issue that be the sort of, you know, political issue that,
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uh, aside from the, the human suffering that kind of was played out through all of this is,
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do we break our rules? Do we bend our rules to, you know, to avoid a conflict with China? Uh,
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you know, we interviewed Brian Mulroney in the book and he said, you know, you know what,
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it's terrible what happened to these guys, but, uh, you know, we have to honor our treaties with our
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best friends, the United States. Otherwise, what good is our word? Uh, so there was no,
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you know, there was really wasn't room to, uh, screw up the arrest and let her get away.
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I mean, what, what, one of the interesting questions is, you know, was, uh, global affairs
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Canada in the loop when the arrest was made? Because, um, certainly, um, the view of some
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of the former very senior officials in that department who we talked to was that, um, they
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would have, uh, smelled, uh, a rat, uh, a mile away here, uh, in this case and would have strongly
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urge that, um, uh, you know, uh, Canada, uh, you know, not, not, not get involved in this as,
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as, you know, as, as Mike just said, the view of, of many was, um, uh, you know, botch it, uh, say,
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you know, the, the message arrived late, uh, she's already on the plane to, to Mexico. So I think,
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you know, one of the interesting questions, and it's an unanswered question, is who actually knew
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what, when this arrest take place, arrest took place? And, and was, you know, PMO, um, and the
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prime minister himself, uh, uh, aware of this and, and the consequences that would, uh, that would,
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uh, you know, clearly come from it, uh, when, uh, uh, when they, uh, detained her in Vancouver
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airport. And, and, you know, uh, we'll, we won't see those files for a while yet.
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I mean, what we do know right now though, is that, um, the RCMP knew, uh, intelligence services
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knew their American counterparts knew the border Canadian border services were really aware.
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They, they came up to speed really quick on who this person was and how important she was and who
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her father was the founder of, of, you know, this company, um, you know, tech royalty in China,
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basically business royalty. Um, and it also, but it raises the question that, uh, I mean,
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I think we did find out later and it was made public probably at a press conference that,
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you know, the prime minister's office did in fact know, or was tipped off. But as we've seen time
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and time again, and just lately with all kinds of other events is, uh, you know, the whiff of a,
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of a political leader, uh, giving advice to a law enforcement agency and how to do their job.
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We know, we know that doesn't go back. That doesn't play well either. So, uh, so it's, uh, it's,
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uh, you know, it's, uh, and, uh, and whatever does happen, if that happens, then it can,
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you can make the argument that that totally plays into the, to the intent of, of the Chinese
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to disrupt our democracy. Okay. Look, they can say, look, they, they broke their own rules. They,
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they played fast and loose and all of that. So, you know, so, so it's, it's, it's, it was a tough,
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One of the claims from China as, uh, the Trudeau government was defending, um, arresting
00:16:30.520
man was always that, uh, well, you know, you guys don't always follow the rule of law because
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this happened just before, uh, SNC Lavalin broke wide open and they kept throwing SNC
00:16:42.400
in the face of the Canadian government saying, well, you follow the rule of law when it's
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suits you, but you don't, you didn't in this case.
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Well, I see, I, I, Brian, just, you know, the, the other dimension to this is, you know,
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was there white house intervention with the justice department in going after
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Meng Wanzhou? Because if you look at other, you know, violations of us sanctions
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cases, which was, you know, the basis for the arrest and, um, uh, you know, the, the
00:17:14.060
accusation, uh, uh, against Meng Wanzhou was that she had lied in a presentation she
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gave to the Hong Kong Shanghai banking corporation about Huawei's relationship with
00:17:26.480
its, um, uh, Iran based, uh, subsidiary, uh, Skycom. Um, you know, it was all pretty
00:17:34.200
tenuous actually. Um, uh, and, you know, the, the offending slide was one slide, uh,
00:17:41.040
that, um, uh, didn't have that, uh, information on it, but, but the real issue is why did they
00:17:47.820
go after her and not the company? Because normally you go after the company, you negotiate
00:17:53.440
then, uh, you know, deferred prosecution agreement, et cetera, et cetera. And, and my
00:17:59.520
suspicion, um, uh, is that, um, you know, the Trump administration, uh, had no, uh,
00:18:07.580
compunction about inter interfering with the work of the justice department. And, you
00:18:13.280
know, this may well have been a case where, uh, uh, officials in the white house, uh, on
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the national security council said, you know, let's go after Meng, uh, herself, not just
00:18:26.840
Hey, I, and I want to ask you about Trump in a moment, but, um, I think it was you
00:18:31.220
fan. And so I'll start with you that you mentioned, um, one of you mentioned John
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Manley earlier and, and, and Manley did make those comments. Oh, you know, we could have
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just botched it and let her get on the plane, but there were others that jumped out and, and
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immediately said, we should cut a deal with China. Many of them, prominent Canadians, uh,
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conservatives and liberals, uh, former ministers, former prime minister, Jean Chrétien, I believe
00:18:56.440
was one of them. Were you surprised at how many prominent Canadians were willing to step
00:19:01.980
up and say, yeah, forget about our treaty with our American friends, just cut a deal,
00:19:07.880
So there, there, there are two dimensions there. One is, you know, the sort of views of Manley,
00:19:13.940
Chrétien, uh, others, um, um, you know, who had, uh, had extensive, certainly on, in, in the
00:19:22.560
Chrétien era. I mean, that was, uh, you know, the era of trade, uh, uh, missions, Team Canada
00:19:29.360
missions to China. Um, uh, you know, the, the corporate sector, um, did not want, uh, to see a
00:19:38.080
disruption in relations with China. They wanted to, uh, expand business opportunities in China. So,
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you know, I'm, to be honest, I, I wasn't surprised at, uh, uh, the views of those who said, uh, you
00:19:53.360
know, let's, let's cut a deal. There was a letter that, um, was sent to the prime minister's office
00:20:00.360
and full disclosure. Uh, I, I signed that letter, uh, and that was in 2020. And, um, that was,
00:20:08.220
that was really motivated, uh, by, by two things. One was, um, uh, COVID had struck, um, people were
00:20:17.180
dying. Uh, there was real concern that these two guys, um, were, you know, at great risk. Uh, and
00:20:24.000
this is before we had vaccines, you know, we're talking 2020, um, in, in the full throes of, uh,
00:20:31.180
of COVID. Um, secondly, um, those who looked carefully and including, you know, some of
00:20:38.580
Canada's most, uh, distinguished, uh, extradition experts, um, who said, you know, the, the rule
00:20:46.000
of law here, um, uh, you know, there's, there's sort of a fork in the road here and, and given
00:20:53.800
the highly political nature of this case, um, there's nothing to stop Canada from, uh, cutting,
00:20:59.960
cutting a deal with the Chinese. Uh, that was, um, that was, uh, uh, I think, uh, um, you
00:21:07.440
know, part, part of the motivation here, uh, and also recognition that, you know, the Trump
00:21:13.080
administration was cutting deals, to be honest, left, right, and center to, uh, get Americans
00:21:19.260
out of Iranian jails, out of, you know, uh, uh, Syrian jails, uh, uh, out of, uh, you
00:21:26.340
know, uh, uh, uh, all sorts of other, uh, places where they'd run into, into, uh, into
00:21:32.660
trouble. And, and so, you know, the sense was, you know, given, given the, the personal
00:21:41.220
risk these two guys were at and, um, and, um, uh, you know, they were now, um, you know,
00:21:48.200
they'd also been formally charged, um, Schellenberg, who was, uh, uh, a Canadian, uh, correct me,
00:21:55.180
Michael, but he was a Canadian who'd been detained in China and was executed. So I think
00:21:59.940
there was, no, no, he wasn't, he was, he was, he was convicted of drug dealing, drug trafficking.
00:22:05.500
He got a, he got a life sentence, life sentence. And then, and then, and then the life sentence
00:22:10.420
was, um, um, it increased to a death sentence, but he was never, he was never actually executed,
00:22:15.980
but it was all part of the pressure play along with saying, you know, so there was, there was
00:22:20.340
real, there was real concern there that, you know, they, that their lives were, were at risk. And,
00:22:26.100
um, you know, Canadian governments in the past had, had cut deals with, uh, very unsavory
00:22:31.580
characters when Bob Fowler, uh, a very special, uh, uh, was, uh, kidnapped, uh, by, uh, Al Qaeda
00:22:39.500
in the Maghreb, uh, um, you know, we, we, we actually paid some serious money there to, uh, you
00:22:46.200
know, to, to release him. So negotiating hostage, uh, uh, uh, treaty, uh, you know, uh, negotiating
00:22:56.360
to, you know, to get hostages released is, is, um, is, uh, you know, well-established
00:23:02.480
practice, including by the government of Canada.
00:23:05.320
Yeah. An unsavory business, but one that does happen. We need to take a quick break. And
00:23:09.520
when we come back, I do, I do want to ask you about Trump's double dealing and issues like
00:23:14.040
that. And, and also, um, you know, comparisons to, to how Michael Kovrig, Michael Spavor
00:23:20.580
were treated compared to Manoiseau living it up in West Vancouver. Well, we'll talk about
00:23:27.260
that when we come back. Was Donald Trump trying to do a double deal when it came to the two
00:23:32.860
Michaels? That's something that, uh, is put forward in the new book, the two Michaels by
00:23:37.180
Mike Blanchfield and Fenn Osler-Hampson. And so, um, Mike, I guess I'll, I'll start with
00:23:43.000
you. Um, and then here from Fenn, uh, obviously Trump was someone who, you know, I, I don't
00:23:52.000
have that page open, but you, you quote him right in the book about, yeah, we'll talk about
00:23:55.760
that. We'll cut a deal. Yeah. He was freely talking about cutting deals. And in the end
00:24:01.000
it, it was an American deal that, that got them out. But was he playing a game with the
00:24:06.220
lives of two Canadians? Um, he clearly saw a link between people in prison and how to
00:24:13.980
cut a trade deal. And this was sort of a, a, a bombshell he dropped during an interview
00:24:18.620
with the Reuters news agency early on that, uh, you know, he wasn't above doing this. Um,
00:24:23.360
um, and I was in the white house. I was in the oval office when, um, he met Justin Trudeau
00:24:27.800
in 2019, a year later. And it was one of those classic Trump photo ops, which turned into
00:24:34.180
a 20 minute press conference, which most of it was Canadian reporters shouting at
00:24:37.860
Trump, uh, and of him taking the bait and answering, what are you going to help these
00:24:41.400
guys? What are you going to do? And he, the press conference ended with him basically
00:24:46.260
suggesting, hinting, more or less saying, yeah, yeah, I'll be talking to Xi Jinping at
00:24:50.300
the G20 summit next month. And, uh, I'll bring, I'll see what I can do. Sort of a typical
00:24:54.260
kind of Trump, like, uh, yeah, I'll, uh, talk about your deal there. And it was never
00:24:57.900
really clear what he did, if anything. Um, and, uh, uh, and it just seemed like they
00:25:05.340
were sort of collateral damage in terms of his, you know, ongoing trade wars with China
00:25:09.520
and trying to gain competitive advantage, you know, for American business and manufacturers.
00:25:14.660
I mean, but when you fast forward to sort of the, when, after he's out of power and Biden
00:25:19.980
is in power, I mean, it took the Biden administration about nine months to review the case. They, Joe
00:25:24.860
Biden did a, an appearance with Trudeau in, uh, in Ottawa, virtually their first summit
00:25:29.040
during COVID right after he was inaugurated in early 2021 and signaled that he didn't
00:25:33.260
like this. He was going to take a look at it. Um, and again, what, what got them out
00:25:39.320
of Dodge literally was a deal, but it had to be brokered by the Americans. And it was Biden
00:25:45.040
himself using leverage and capital with Xi Jinping directly, um, to, um, to basically make
00:25:52.440
the argument that you need to get rid of this irritants. Um, and again, Biden didn't want
00:25:57.700
to be seen to be messing with his justice department and how it was investigating things.
00:26:02.140
So Dominic Barton, the Canadian ambassador to China, who's a former, you know, captain
00:26:06.940
of industry got involved. They went to the United States. They helped educate the Huawei people
00:26:12.720
about, Hey, maybe you could make a deal here and take some kind of business penalty and the
00:26:17.940
case could be reconfigured and everyone saves face. And what it was, was an elaborate dance
00:26:23.820
to engineer a prisoner swap with everyone trying to save face. And that included the Canadians
00:26:28.300
saying, well, you know what, we followed the rule of law. We didn't cave. We didn't, you
00:26:32.200
know, get the minister to intervene under a special clause in our expedition law that the Chinese
00:26:37.920
knew full well existed because they did their homework. Um, and, um, and, you know, so when
00:26:43.340
we saw the chain of events play out, it was American prosecutors go to court and, um, somewhere
00:26:49.100
New York, greater New York city, they withdraw the charges provisionally, uh, reinstate, uh,
00:26:55.500
you know, this, this sort of DPA style prosecution against the company. And then Canada, you know,
00:27:01.420
the Canadian prosecutors, uh, or the American, the Canadian prosecutors on behalf of the Americans
00:27:05.580
making the extradition request, stand up in a Vancouver courtroom a few hours later, and
00:27:09.640
they're, they're dropping the case. Everybody goes free. There's a, there's a jet with its
00:27:14.860
engines warming on the tarmac of a private hangar in Vancouver and off goes Meng. And
00:27:19.440
meanwhile, behind the scenes, the, you know, the two Michaels are rustled out of their, their,
00:27:24.060
their cells, they're brought together and they're put on an aircraft and, uh, and literally
00:27:28.920
it ended with a deal. And to pivot it back to Trump, Trump didn't make the deal. He didn't
00:27:34.580
seem willing to make a deal. He, you know, jumped the deal maker. Well, you know what,
00:27:38.360
there was no deal to be had with Canada. He's at, we, we know he's the very least he's put
00:27:43.420
it mildly. He's transactional. And looking back on it today, there was really nothing
00:27:47.720
in it for him. You know, why should I do a favor for my friend or ally? Well, in the
00:27:52.620
end it was Biden who did that. And then we saw sort of it come full circle just recently
00:27:56.720
when there is Biden back in, in parliament, it's a real visit. It's not virtual. And suddenly
00:28:02.500
there are the two Michaels and it was, uh, it kind of, uh, you know, Biden was the guy
00:28:07.600
who basically put the elbow grease into this to get it done in the end, uh, to help out
00:28:12.800
Canada, to do us a favor, to get a deal for us. Yeah, no, I think, I, I think it wasn't
00:28:16.980
just to help Canada. Um, uh, it, it's, it's pretty clear that, um, because, uh, Xi Jinping
00:28:25.440
had been embarrassed on the world stage, uh, with the arrest, um, that, um, the Chinese
00:28:33.060
made it very clear to the Americans, this issue had to be resolved if the Biden administration
00:28:39.500
was going to turn the page, the Trump page on relations with China. Um, I, I know that
00:28:45.760
sounds funny to be talking about or odd to be talking about that now, but, you know, Biden
00:28:51.340
made it clear. He wanted to have, uh, uh, a much more, um, uh, working, uh, uh, professional
00:28:58.820
relationship with, uh, you know, with, uh, with the Chinese. Um, uh, of course that, that
00:29:06.160
hasn't happened, but, uh, he wanted to recalibrate it. Um, this issue, uh, had to
00:29:12.460
be resolved, uh, uh, from a Chinese standpoint, uh, as well. Uh, the second point, uh, I would
00:29:20.940
make there is that, um, remember that, um, the Chinese were going to be hosting the, uh,
00:29:26.820
the, uh, Winter Olympics, uh, at the end of, uh, 2021, um, you know, which had been, uh,
00:29:34.280
uh, delayed, uh, uh, because of, uh, COVID, um, this case was kind of hanging like an albatross.
00:29:43.260
I mean, it had, uh, you know, gathered, uh, enormous international attention, uh, partly
00:29:49.200
through, you know, or largely because of the efforts of, uh, our own government to, uh, you
00:29:55.460
know, bring it to the attention of our allies and others saying, you know, this can happen
00:29:59.140
to, to your people too. Um, and, um, so, so, uh, uh, uh, you know, the issue really had
00:30:07.420
to be, had to be dealt with. Um, and, and, you know, it, it, it came up in, uh, um, negotiations
00:30:15.420
that, uh, Deputy Secretary Sherman had with the Chinese, uh, at the end of July, 21. It was
00:30:22.720
the subject of a phone call, uh, between the White House, uh, um, uh, you know, President
00:30:28.780
Biden, Gigi Ping, in, uh, in September. Uh, I mean, Mike's absolutely right that, um, that,
00:30:35.460
um, you know, uh, uh, Biden, um, you know, wanted to, to do something for Trudeau here. Um,
00:30:44.320
but, uh, but it was also in the American interests to, uh, to resolve the case.
00:30:49.100
I think you want to do something for Canada. I mean, look at the situation of the Americans
00:30:53.360
right now. I mean, they're, the world is fracturing all around them, right? You've
00:30:57.400
got, uh, China and Russia, you know, circling the wagons on Ukraine. You've got, uh, major
00:31:03.280
parts of the, uh, you know, of, of the world who are not on side with, um, you know, Canada
00:31:09.800
and its NATO allies and some Asian allies against Russia. Uh, the Americans don't have the power
00:31:15.540
base they once had. And it's been made very clear to me in conversations I've had with
00:31:19.700
senior Americans that, um, actually as little as we are and how insignificant we see, see
00:31:25.400
each other, like every, every bit of help helps, uh, you know, if we send a few extra
00:31:31.300
tanks or, you know, buckets of ammunition to Ukraine, the Americans appreciate that because
00:31:37.260
we're part of a team that is on their side helping. Um, and it also, and Biden has said
00:31:43.120
this repeatedly, um, and, uh, it bears repeat. I think it's important in this context. Uh,
00:31:49.000
the Americans are just relieved that they've got us on their border because they've got
00:31:51.880
Mexico on the other border with a whole host of immigration and political issues to deal
00:31:56.920
with their immigration. You know, it's an, it's a gateway from, you know, massive, you
00:32:01.980
know, mass migration through, you know, the Western hemisphere and Latin America into the
00:32:06.220
United States and sometimes up into Canada. Uh, so it's a very legitimate, uh, feeling that
00:32:12.600
the Americans have these days that yes, they, they always take us for granted. And, you
00:32:15.780
know, we're barely acknowledged in Washington. We matter more now than we ever did because
00:32:20.700
we're part of a, uh, dwindling group of countries that really is in their power sphere. And, uh,
00:32:26.380
as we know, everything is so fractured, uncertain right now with this new war. Um, and we see
00:32:31.600
a new detainee, American detainee, you know, the wall street journal right now in, in Moscow
00:32:36.600
as well. So it's, uh, it's all about interests. And as Finn points out, yeah, the Chinese
00:32:41.540
had a, uh, you know, a great interest in getting this irritant out of the way, they
00:32:44.580
were going to host the world at the Olympics. It was all about saving face and putting on
00:32:48.480
a good show. So, you know, after a certain point, yes, Xi Jinping was disrespected, uh,
00:32:55.160
you know, when this all happened and, and, uh, his minions ran around figuring out a way
00:32:59.800
to, to do something, but in the end it became an irritant. And I'm sure the thought in Beijing,
00:33:04.780
they came around to the argument, they came around to the point of view that they had to be
00:33:07.940
persuaded heavily that this is just a great big pain and an irritant. You got to get rid of,
00:33:11.920
we got to figure out a way to get rid of these, you know, get these guys out of here and hopefully
00:33:15.860
never hear from them again. Before I ask about going forward and, you know, the, the efforts
00:33:22.780
by the Canadian government on extrajudicial rendition and such, can either of you settle
00:33:29.540
for me, this idea, start with you, Finn, and then from Mike, um, did the Trudeau government
00:33:37.180
play a big role in brokering this release or was it all the Americans? I've heard from
00:33:42.860
folks in Ottawa. Oh no, very much a big role heard from people in Washington. No, no role at all. It
00:33:50.140
was a decision to, to move forward with deferred prosecution. Um, is either one true or is it a case
00:33:57.220
of the truth is somewhere in the middle? Well, um, uh, we, we, we did talk, uh, uh, uh, both on
00:34:05.860
the record and off the record, uh, with senior, uh, officials in the administration. And, um, uh, uh,
00:34:16.180
it's clear that, um, our ambassador, uh, to, uh, to Washington, um, uh, ambassador, uh, um, Hillman
00:34:26.180
Hillman played, uh, uh, uh, a really important role in, in, you know, keeping, keeping the issue
00:34:33.460
alive. Um, there were, uh, uh, a number of high level meetings with White House officials that involved,
00:34:42.500
uh, uh, uh, ambassador Hillman and, um, and also, uh, Dominique Barton. Um, and, and so,
00:34:50.980
you know, getting it on the radar, uh, particularly with the new administration was important. Uh,
00:34:59.060
the second point I would make is that, um, you know, even though he's come in for a lot of criticism,
00:35:05.940
um, in many ways, the, the, uh, unsung hero in this story is Dominique Barton.
00:35:12.500
And he played, uh, an important role and, and Mike touched on this, but, uh, I think,
00:35:18.180
you know, we might want to underline it, um, in really helping, uh, the Chinese helping Huawei,
00:35:29.780
which was not getting, by the way, the best legal advice and team in the United States,
00:35:35.940
because nobody wanted to touch them with a 10 foot pole. Um, uh, you know, given,
00:35:41.620
given the troubles that they had, uh, run into, uh, with, uh, uh, successive, uh, administrations in
00:35:49.540
Washington, um, in, in, in, in, in helping them understand the game, uh, the legal game of deferred
00:35:57.220
prosecution agreements and that, that, um, you know, this was sort of standard practice. Um,
00:36:04.500
you know, you admit, uh, uh, your culpability and an annex to an agreement, uh, uh, you know,
00:36:11.540
which is kind of, you know, ultimately what, what happened there, but, but really sort of,
00:36:17.300
you know, pushing them along to say, you know, uh, there is a deal to be made here. And, um, and once
00:36:26.900
you had a new sort of team in the justice department, uh, with, uh, with the Biden administration, uh,
00:36:33.140
that, you know, was looking at this case, um, they, they, uh, you know, deferred prosecution
00:36:39.140
discussions had taken place under Trump, but went nowhere, uh, as Mike mentioned, but, you know,
00:36:44.420
they got traction under Biden because, you know, once, um, you know, his officials started looking
00:36:50.340
at the case here, they, you know, they kind of came to the conclusion, we might, we might actually
00:36:56.500
lose this one in court. So, um, so I think, you know, there, there was a greater appetite to, uh,
00:37:03.460
to come to an agreement here, but, but, you know, we, we, um, you know, our diplomats, uh, did,
00:37:11.140
did play an important role. Um, I think, uh, and Mike can talk about this because, um, you know,
00:37:17.300
he was, uh, uh, uh, tracking Philippe Champagne, but, um, the, um, the, uh, um, uh, uh, agreement, uh,
00:37:27.220
or, or declaration on arbitrary detention, which, um, Canadian officials got a whole bunch of
00:37:33.380
countries to sign up to really, you know, put the Chinese in the spotlight on this one.
00:37:39.620
And so maybe Mike, I can jump in and, and just do a slight redirect on that because, uh, with
00:37:48.020
China, that sort of thing can work. And there was an attempt to have a, an international conference
00:37:53.940
last week. It's since been put off, but I don't see that embarrassing, uh, someone like Putin when
00:38:00.860
we're dealing with Evan, uh, Gershkovic of the wall street journal. So was that a successful play
00:38:07.020
by Canada and, and our allies in, in saying we're against this, uh, extrajudicial, uh, detention,
00:38:14.340
but will it have limited appeal? Yeah. Well, I think, I think the way, I mean, the way it works is
00:38:20.200
you start with, um, an aspiration and you get a bunch of people to agree on an idea. So, you know,
00:38:25.520
um, you know, to use another example, a long time ago, uh, eventually people came around to the idea
00:38:31.300
smoking is bad for you. Um, and you shouldn't smoke, probably die. It'll kill you in a second
00:38:36.860
hand. Smoke will kill people around you. And then eventually regulation and binding, you know,
00:38:42.540
mechanisms came into place. And now we have warning labels and fewer people smoke. And it was that way
00:38:48.420
with landmines. Don't use landmines. They're really miserable weapons. And you blow up innocent
00:38:51.940
kids and look at the horrible pictures, you know? So I think it's starting that way with this. You
00:38:56.100
don't take innocent people, hostages from another country to, for a political gain and lock them up
00:39:00.820
as hostages to negotiate, which is what we're seeing with the wall street journal. Um, you know,
00:39:07.060
reporter who Brian, frankly, is a member of our tribe, right? You know, I'm sure we don't, I don't,
00:39:11.560
I don't like seeing that any more than you do. Right. No. So, but here we're, here we go again.
00:39:15.480
But I think what the process of doing that and, and to talk about Francois-Philippe Champagne for a
00:39:21.020
moment, cause I covered him while he was doing it and spoke to him about it in quite a bit of detail. I mean,
00:39:25.120
he was basically hell bent on doing whatever he could to embarrass the Chinese and not embarrass
00:39:30.980
the Chinese, but pressure them, but to bring other players to the table. Uh, and I think it
00:39:35.760
was useful for Biden and the Americans and the justice department when they could look and say,
00:39:41.040
okay, well, Canada's got, you know, eventually it was 70, 70 countries saying, this is bad. This is,
00:39:46.560
you know, smoking is bad for you. It kills you. This is really bad behavior. You don't take other
00:39:51.060
people, citizens hostage to score, win political battles. Um, it, it, it gave an impetus, like a
00:39:59.160
moral impetus to the Americans who were the practical, you know, they, they, they, they had
00:40:03.700
to execute this practically. They had to decide, it was their case. They had to decide how they're
00:40:07.780
going to reconfigure it and do the deal that they did by withdrawing the charge specifically
00:40:13.400
against the person focusing on the company. They have a lot of Canadian help. And I think the
00:40:18.320
Canadians did everything that they could have done politically at the diplomatic level at
00:40:22.220
the political level. Uh, they built this coalition that may or may not, you know, make, I don't
00:40:28.040
know what kind of difference it might make with Russia and this, and this, and, um, and I mean,
00:40:32.540
but, but, but so we'll see, so we'll see what happens. Um, but I think it really, uh, I mean,
00:40:36.960
it was, uh, it was kind of, um, it was the assist, you know, I mean, they, they, they put the ball
00:40:41.500
in play and the Americans scored the touchdown. I mean, that's, I hate to dumb it down that way,
00:40:46.120
but I think that's basically how it all came to pass. Yeah. And China's not Russia. I mean,
00:40:51.520
China, you know, does a huge amount of business with the rest of the world. And, um, and, uh,
00:40:58.880
you know, they were, there were lots of people doing business in China who, you know, were coming
00:41:04.560
to the conclusion, gee, this could happen to us. Um, you know, Russia has very, certainly now very
00:41:12.520
limited, um, uh, economic ties with, uh, certainly the Western world. And so that gives fewer points
00:41:21.120
of leverage, uh, you know, to come back to your question, um, and, and, you know, for the Chinese
00:41:27.340
saving face is very important part of, uh, or maintaining face, keeping face is an important part
00:41:33.420
of their culture. Uh, I don't think Putin gives two figs about how he's viewed internationally. So.
00:41:40.440
I, I really don't either. Gents, uh, so many more questions, most of which are answered in the book,
00:41:46.300
but it's been a fantastic discussion today. So I want to thank you for your time and encourage
00:41:51.840
everyone to, uh, to pick up the two Michaels by Mike Blanchfield, Fenn Osler-Hampson. It's by
00:41:57.180
Sutherland House Books. You can find it anywhere books are sold. Thanks so much.
00:42:03.840
Full comment is a post-media podcast. My name's Brian Lilly, your host. This episode was produced by
00:42:09.300
Andre Proulx. Theme music by Bryce Hall. Kevin Libin is the executive producer. You can subscribe
00:42:14.380
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