China sentences Canadian to death for drug trafficking

A Chinese court on Tuesday sentenced a Canadian national to death for producing and trafficking methamphetamine, a highly addictive and illegal psycho-stimulant drug.

An American and a Chinese were also given death although the sentencing for the former will be suspended for two years while four Mexicans were sent to life imprisonment.

Jiangmen Intermediate People's Tribunal in Guangdong province published a statement on its website stating that the Canadian Fan Wei and Chinese Wu Ziping had been involved in the drug offences between July and November 2012, reports Efe news.

All of them established a drug production centre in Taishan, also in Guangdong, where four other Chinese citizens played a secondary role who were given minor prison sentences.

They have 10 days to appeal their sentences.

According to Amnesty International, China leads the list of countries with the highest number of death sentences in the world "but the true extent of the use of the death penalty in China is unknown as this data is classified as a state secret".

The non-profit reported that in 2018 itself thousands of executions were carried out in China.

According to Chinese criminal law, any person who traffics, imports, transports or manufactures opium in quantities greater than one kilo, or heroin in quantities more than 50 grams or other narcotics in large quantities, can be sentenced to 15 years in prison, life imprisonment or death, in addition to the confiscation of property.

Fan Wei is the second Canadian to be sentenced to death this year after a court in the Liaoning gave death to Robert Lloyd Schellenberg also for drug trafficking.

Diplomatic relations between China and Canada have become strained after the arrest in December 2018 of the Chief Financial Officer of Huawei, Meng Wanzhou, in Vancouver with an extradition request from the US pending.

Following Meng's arrest, China arrested two other Canadians, diplomat Michael Kovrig and businessman Michael Spavor, on charges of jeopardising Beijing's national security.