in World News Canada’s Liberals Stand by Candidate Who Suggested Handing Dissidents to China
by John Hayward
The Conservative opposition in Canada demanded Liberal Prime Minister Mark Carney fire a Toronto-area candidate, Paul Chiang, for suggesting that an anti-Communist Conservative named Joe Tay should be handed over to the brutal Chinese government in exchange for a bounty on dissidents.
Tay is an immigrant from Hong Kong who has been critical of the Beijing-controlled puppet government on the island. Under the authoritarian “national security law” imposed by China to crush the Hong Kong democracy movement in 2020, criticizing the government is an illegal act of “sedition.”
“If anyone here can take [Tay] to the Chinese Consulate General in Toronto, you can get the million-dollar reward,” Chiang told a Chinese-language press conference in January.
Tay was running against Chiang in the district of Markham-Unionville at the time but is now the candidate for a different district. Chiang has been a Member of Parliament (MP) from Markham-Unionville since 2021. The bounty offered by the Chinese Communist Party for dissidents was $1 million in Hong Kong dollars, which works out to about $184,000 Canadian.
The demand for Carney to dismiss Chiang came from Conservative Michael Chong, who has been targeted by Chinese election interference for his own criticism of the Communist regime. Chong is currently a candidate for the Conservative Party for Wellington-Halton Hills North and has previously testified before the U.S. Congress about his own political persecution, noting that Chinese meddling in Canadian politics is a serious problem.
A Canadian intelligence commission concluded in April 2024 that China “clandestinely and deceptively interfered in both the 2019 and 2021 elections” – both of which were won by the Liberal Party. Liberal Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was heavily criticized for ignoring these warnings.
On March 30, Chong wrote on his X account that “[a]t least three Canadians have been coerced against their will to return to the People’s Republic of China,” indicating that the bounty touted by Chiang is no joke. Chinese expatriates living in Canada, and other countries, have good reason to fear the long arm of transnational repression from Beijing, especially if they still have families in China.
“Paul Chiang’s support for the CCP’s (Chinese Communist Party’s) illegal and unjust bounty on a Canadian citizen is shocking, particularly to the countless Canadians of Chinese descent who have been targeted and harassed by the Communist regime,” Chong said in a press release on March 29.
“After the lost Liberal decade of turning a blind eye to foreign interference by the CCP, warnings from experts, and a public inquiry, the Liberals continue to tolerate foreign interference putting the security of Canadians at risk,” his statement read.