Family readies for Garratts’ release, urges tougher stand on China
BEIJING AND OTTAWA — The Globe and Mail
The children of a Canadian couple held by China have been told to get ready for their release, but are calling on Ottawa to abandon a quiet campaign of international diplomacy and lobby more loudly on their behalf.
“At this point, we’re pretty much preparing for my parents to come back to Canada. We don’t know exactly when, but the Canadian government has given us an indication that we should prepare for that,” said Simeon Garratt, in an interview Wednesday.
His parents Kevin and Julia Garratt were detained in early August by Chinese authorities who said the Christian couple, who owned a coffee shop in a small city on the North Korean border, were suspected of stealing state military and defence-research secrets.
The couple has since been held separately and under heavy guard in Dandong, their hometown, while China’s State Secrets Bureau conducts an investigation. Their contact with the outside world has been heavily constrained, although they have been allowed consular visits every two weeks, more than China is obligated to provide.
In a note to family members from the latest visit last week, the Canadian embassy in Beijing reported that “both Kevin and Julia said that when released, they would return to Canada (to Toronto) and stay with Julia’s sister in Milton. Our consul outlined that it was likely the Chinese would ask the family to buy tickets via the Embassy when the time came.”
The note offer no definitive confirmation that the couple will be released. Chinese authorities have, in the past, been reluctant to go easy on Western citizens they accuse of stealing state secrets. Several people have in recent years been handed lengthy prison sentences.
But in conversations with officials in the Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development, the Garratts have been told the signs are positive. Canadian officials have, in a series of meetings in Ottawa and Beijing, sought to apply pressure for the couple’s release. They have threatened to have Prime Minister Stephen Harper snub an invitation to a November meeting in Beijing with Chinese leadership. In September, Ottawa also suddenly ratified the Foreign Investment Promotion and Protection Act, a move that pleased China.
In China, Peter Garratt, the couple’s second son, has begun the work of packing some of their belongings and preparing to permanently shutter the coffee shop they owned, which was named after him. “It’s extremely sad,” Simeon said.
Packing belongings is an admission that the family is unlikely to ever return to their lives in China.
Chinese officials have been stingy with information, Canadian sources have said. Ottawa has publicly said little about the couple, with Canadian officials opting to engage quietly with Chinese counterparts rather than risk the potential nastiness of a public spat.
But there are signs that may change. The Garratt family has engaged in a letter-writing campaign, urging support from opposition parties and provincial premiers, many of whom will soon come to China on a trade delegation. It’s also now calling on the Conservative leadership to be more outspoken.
“The Canadian government should take a very strong stance on the fact that these are clearly people that were doing good work in China, have been in China for over 30 years and are Canadian citizens that were running a business,” Simeon Garratt said. “This is just a bad precedent for people that want to do business in China.”
Ottawa may be open to such a strategy. It has asked the Garratts to take a more public role in the media, raising the profile of the case.
And sources have told The Globe and Mail that officials in Ottawa are drafting a parliamentary motion calling on China to release the Garratts. The motion is intended to be supported by all parties in an effort to show a united front against their detention. One source said Foreign Affairs is leading talks on the motion – a sign that the international impact of such a resolution, presumably on Chinese leadership, is front of mind for those creating it.
It’s unclear when it will be introduced, or even whether it will ever be brought forward to the House of Commons. Yet its drafting is a sign that the Canadian government is at least weighing a louder response to the Garratts’ detention.
Such a move may, however, have consequences for Canada-China relations, particularly in co-ordination with a snubbed invitation to a high-profile leaders’ meeting.
A motion in support of the Garratts is “a horrifying conception. It would be a disaster,” said Paul Evans, a University of British Columbia international relations professor.
“If we looked at a Richter scale of impact on bilateral relations, a parliamentary motion would hit about a five out of 10. Publicly embarrassing the Chinese by not accepting the invitation on the grounds that are being explicitly floated” – the Garratts’ case, and allegations of China hacking into Canadian government computers – “that’s going to be an 8.5.”
He likened it to “playing chicken with a bulldozer.”
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