Two Canadians are being held hostage in China
Episode Stats
Words per Minute
184.64333
Summary
Two Canadians have been detained in China for over 100 days, and one of them has now had his glasses taken away. This is unacceptable, and we need to speak out about it more often, and call it what it is: a hostage situation.
Transcript
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The latest development of the two Canadians detained in China, Michael Kovrig and Michael
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Spavor, is a particularly sad and petty one. We've learned that one of them has had his glasses taken
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away. They are still being confined pretty much 24-7 in their cells, they're being interrogated
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every day, but one of the few dignities remaining to someone confined in a small space in prison like
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that is that you can do things like read and write to pass the time, to keep sane. Well, this has now
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been taken away from one of them, and it's just one of the continuing turning of the screws that
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China has been doing against Canada ever since we first arrested Meng Wanzhou, the Huawei CFO,
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and prepared her for the extradition proceedings to be sent to the United States. Now, it's getting
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to the point that the months are ticking by, the days are chalking up, and this is well over 100
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days that these guys have been held under incredibly, incredibly dubious circumstances. There is not a
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single voice in Canada that's willing to step forward and say, well, China may have a case
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against these guys. We know it's all bogus. We know it's all nonsense. So why don't we call it for what
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it is? The two Michaels are hostages. China is holding Canadian citizens hostages. Prominent ones
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at that. An ex-diplomat currently on leave from his diplomatic duties, and in the other case, an
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entrepreneur. It's simply unacceptable. Why aren't we using this language, and why aren't Canadians
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getting riled up about it more? Well, because the government is leading us to believe that, well,
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this is an ongoing conversation, a dialogue. They accuse us of our canola being infested with pests,
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and we send negotiators. We say, oh, no, that's not the case. There's not actually pests there.
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They turn around and ban all of our meat imports, and we say, okay, well, we'll smooth it over. We'll
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work it over. The detained Canadians, what do we do? We ask U.S. President Donald Trump to bring it up
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with President Xi Jinping. Now, there's a back and forth as to whether he did or he didn't, but it's
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probably most likely that even if Trump did bring it up, he brought it up at the end of the
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conversation. He said, oh, by the way, Justin from Canada, he asked me to bring this thing up.
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Anyway, I know we're talking about trade. We're talking about U.S. matters here, but if you can
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figure out this thing, I don't know. I told him I'd bring it up, so just, you know, there you go. See
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what you can do about it. It's not like Donald Trump met with him singularly to focus on this issue and
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to get results on this issue. It should be a fight that we're fighting, and I use that term quite
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pointedly, fight. It's not a dialogue. It's not a mild-mannered conversation. I mean, China
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they're using fighting words. They were laughing at us in a recent statement, calling us naive,
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saying we have so-called allies. Their former ambassador, Luce, he accused us of all being
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white supremacists full of Western egotism. I mean, no more Mr. Nice Guy here. It's incredibly
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frustrating to watch Prime Minister Justin Trudeau treat this as if it's anywhere within the realm of
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normalcy. It's just not. And I think one way we can change this is by changing our language. Like
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I said, these guys are hostages. Let's call it like it is, and let's start denouncing it and say