An organization representing Uyghur Canadians is withdrawing from the public inquiry into foreign interference, a development that threatens to undermine Commissioner Marie-Josée Hogue’s ability to hear testimony from all vulnerable diaspora communities facing persecution from China.
The Uyghur Rights Advocacy Project wrote to Justice Hogue Wednesday to serve notice that it is formally withdrawing because she granted full standing to former Ontario Liberal cabinet minister Michael Chan, now deputy mayor of Markham, Ont., and independent MP Han Dong. This type of standing means they can cross-examine witnesses and gain access to all evidence collected, including that presented to the inquiry outside of hearings.
Justice Hogue also granted intervenor status to independent Senator Yuen Pau Woo, which allows him to participate in the hearings examining foreign interference in the 2019 and 2021 elections.
“These statuses provide access to highly confidential information, potentially jeopardizing our community and others, allowing them to cross-examine witnesses,” the Uyghur Rights Advocacy Project said in a statement.
The group’s executive director Mehmet Tohti, who says he has faced threatening phones calls from what he asserts are Chinese agents, told The Globe and Mail last week that the group would pull out if Justice Hogue did not reconsider her decision involving the three politicians.
“It is disheartening that the Commissioner has failed to protect individuals like Mehmet and other diaspora community members personally invested in the public inquiry subject matters,” the group said in its statement.
Mr. Tohti’s group was part of the Human Rights Coalition, an umbrella body of Canadian organizations that have spoken out against China’s foreign interference and human-rights abuses. Gloria Fung, president of Canada-Hong Kong Link, which represents people from Hong Kong, said her group would continue to participate in the inquiry.
“We fully respect the Uyghur group’s decision but there are important messages we would like to share with Canadians and the Commissioner about transnational repression and foreign interference,” she said.
In one of Justice Hogue’s December decisions on standing for the inquiry, she acknowledged the allegations of the coalition, noting that in its application the group “claims Mr. Chan, Mr. Dong, and Senator Woo have possible links to and support for the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).”
The commission didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment about the withdrawal of the Uyghur Rights Advocacy Project.
That withdrawal comes as Justice Hogue was urged Wednesday to actively seek out the views of ethnic communities that are victims of harassment and intimidation from hostile countries such as China.
“To be blunt, if you don’t develop an interest in diaspora points of view, I think you will be missing an important component of your mandate,” former Canadian Security Intelligence Service director Richard Fadden told the commission. “The threat to diaspora communities for the purpose of advancing foreign state objectives, I think are becoming increasingly clear.”
Mr. Fadden, who also served as national security adviser to Justin Trudeau and Stephen Harper, said the inquiry must understand that these communities fear Chinese state retribution, particularly if they have family members in China. He urged Justice Hogue to “provide them with confidentiality because people are scared.”
Justice Hogue, a judge on the Quebec Court of Appeal, has promised confidentiality to witnesses who are afraid for their safety. She said full standing was granted to Mr. Dong and Mr. Chan because they had “reputational interest” to defend but also noted that “the right to cross-examination granted to the parties is not absolute.”
In December, Justice Hogue rejected an appeal of the standing granted to these politicians, saying the commission “cannot make findings of fact or jump to conclusions before hearing the evidence.”
Mr. Fadden also told the inquiry that if he learned an MP was under threat, “I would have found a way to do something about it.”
In 2021, CSIS warned Ottawa that Conservative foreign affairs critic Michael Chong and family members in Hong Kong were being targeted by China, but nobody told the MP until The Globe and Mail reported it in May. The government ended up expelling Chinese diplomat Zhao Wei over this targeting.
The government later disclosed that former Conservative Party leader Erin O’Toole and NDP MP Jenny Kwan had also been targeted by Beijing in 2021 – and that they remain targets. The two MPs were also not informed until 2023 that they were targets of China interference.
The inquiry will try to determine if the Prime Minister and senior ministers were telling the truth when they said CSIS Director David Vigneault and senior mandarins did not tell them about threats to their political rivals.
In his testimony, Mr. Fadden said the tendency in Canadian government is toward “overprotection” of information rather than transparency. He recommended approaching Privy Council Clerk John Hannaford if the commission runs into trouble around secrecy.