Trudeau Says CSIS Chose Not to Brief MP Chong on Beijing Threat to Family

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau speaks to reporters ahead of a caucus meeting on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on April 19, 2023. Spencer Colby/The Canadian Press

The decision not to warn Conservative MP Michael Chong on efforts by the Chinese regime to target his family in Hong Kong was made by Canada’s spy agency, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on May 3.

Trudeau said the government wasn’t briefed on the information collected on the issue by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) and that he only learned about it from the media this week.

“CSIS made the determination that it wasn’t something that needed to be raised to a higher level because it wasn’t a significant enough concern,” he told reporters in Ottawa.

Trudeau said CSIS decided to instead provide a generic defensive briefing on China. Chong says he has been briefed on foreign interference but not on the specific threats against him or his family.

The Globe reported on May 1 that the Chinese spy service was seeking information on MP Chong’s family in China to retaliate for his advocacy for human rights in the country.

The report was based on a leaked CSIS assessment on foreign interference, which said that the Chinese Ministry of State Security (MSS) had “taken specific actions to target Canadian MPs” who were behind a 2021 House of Commons motion which called Beijing’s treatment of the Uyghur minority a genocide.

The Globe further reported that Zhao Wei, a diplomat working out of the Chinese consulate in Toronto, was involved in the scheme.

Chong was subsequently briefed by CSIS on May 2 and says he was provided the same information.

The prime minister said he told intelligence agencies that going forward, upper levels of the government should be briefed on such information.

“When there are concerns that talk specifically about any MP, particularly about their family, those need to be elevated, even if CSIS doesn’t feel that it’s a sufficient level of concern for them to take more direct action, we still need to know about it at the upper government level,” he said.

The Epoch Times reached out to CSIS but didn’t immediately hear back.

Global Affairs Canada was also contacted on May 1 to know whether it would take action against Zhao Wei, who is still an accredited diplomat in Canada, but no response was provided.

Previous Globe reporting from a national security source described Zhao as a “suspected intelligence actor.” He is registered as a “consulate officer” with GAC.

“When the government became aware an elected MP was being targeted for an intimidation campaign by a PRC [People’s Republic of China] diplomat here in Canada, they should have taken two actions. First, they should have informed me. Second, they should have declared the diplomat persona non grata,” Chong wrote in a May 1 statement.