Recent documents from the Canadian Intelligence Service and a security investigation have unveiled that two Canadian scientists of Chinese origin, employed at Canada’s largest microbiology lab in Manitoba, have been implicated in “passing secret scientific information to China, one of which poses a real and credible threat to Canadian economic security,” according to The New York Times.
The revelation came as the Canadian Parliament received hundreds of pages of reports concerning researchers Xiangguo Qiu and her husband, Keding Cheng, both born and married in China.
Following a national security review by a special parliamentary committee and another by three retired senior judges, these reports were submitted to the Canadian Parliament.
The unveiling of these documents has reignited prolonged discussions in the Canadian Parliament that began before the latest federal elections in September 2021.
Opposition parties, having requested access to these documents which the government intended to keep confidential at least four times, accused the Liberal government of showing contempt for Parliament in 2021.
Critics of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau have faulted his administration for not adequately addressing Chinese interference in Canadian affairs.
However, Canadian Health Minister Mark Holland assured reporters that “no secrets or national information threatening Canada’s security have ever left the labs.”
The disclosed documents revealed that Qiu failed to declare formal agreements with Chinese institutions, which agreed to fund significant research amounts.
She also agreed to an annual salary of CAD 210,000 (about USD 155,000).
The whereabouts of the couple remain unknown, and they appear to have no clear representatives in Canada.
The documents released do not include any public response from the couple.
During previous interrogations, Qiu repeatedly claimed she was unaware of any security rule violations, blaming the Public Health Agency for not fully explaining the procedures.
She also “attempted to mislead investigators when faced with contradictory evidence,” as reported by The New York Times.
The Canadian Intelligence Service also found Qiu to have “repeatedly misused her relations with researchers and organizations in China,” described as “close and secretive.”
In one of the confidential reports, the intelligence agency stated that when questioned about her exchanges with scientists and organizations in China, she “continued to outright deny, feign ignorance, or tell blatant lies.”
The couple came under suspicion in 2018 when Qiu was named on a patent granted in China, seemingly utilizing research developed by the agency for an Ebola virus vaccine.
An internal investigation found that Dr. Qiu’s trip to Beijing in 2018 was funded by a Chinese biotechnology company.
In 2019, the couple was removed from their positions at the National Microbiology Laboratory in Manitoba, Canada, later stripped of their security clearances, and ultimately terminated in January 2021.
Canadian officials, warning that the country’s academic and research institutions are targets for Chinese intelligence campaigns, have tightened rules on collaborations with foreign universities.
Canadian universities can now be excluded from federal funding if they enter partnerships with any of 100 institutions in China, Russia, and Iran.
