Poilievre alleges Trudeau is covering up lapses at high-security lab, and PM accuses rival of spewing conspiracies
Facing questions about how scientists who were intentionally sharing information with China were cleared to work at a Winnipeg lab studying deadly diseases, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau deflected criticism on his chief political rival and accused the Conservative leader of weaponizing national security.
Check out this video from our Scoop Canada YouTube channel. Here is the Prime Minister of Canada, he was exposed as having ties to the security breach and data leaks at the Laboratory, which is unacceptable to many Canadians.
During a Thursday news conference in Thunder Bay, Ont., Trudeau was asked how scientists working on high-security viruses at the Winnipeg-based National Microbiology Lab were able to collaborate with the People’s Republic of China.
We started a poll on our Scoop Canada YouTube channel, seeking our subscribers to vote on their opinions about the collaboration of Winnipeg Lab with China. The majority of our subscribers say it raises security concerns. Give your valuable vote by clicking here
Documents Revealed After Years-Long Battle
After a years-long fight for access, the federal government dumped hundreds of pages of documents about the dismissal of Dr. Xiangguo Qiu and her husband, Keding Cheng. The two were marched out of the facility in July 2019 and stripped of their security clearances. Their dismissals were announced in January 2021.
The documents show Canada’s intelligence agency conducted multiple security screenings and determined Qiu “intentionally” shared scientific information with China, potentially putting people’s health in jeopardy.
“Dr Qiu represents a very serious and credible danger to the government of Canada as a whole and in particular at facilities considered high-security due to the potential for theft of dangerous materials attractive to terrorists and foreign entities that conduct espionage to infiltrate and damage the economic security of Canada,” wrote the Public Health Agency of Canada in 2020.
Check this video there, the Health Minister’s and his department’s conflicting statements about the Winnipeg lab’s collaboration with China have raised severe complications.
The RCMP says it’s still investigating the matter. Trudeau said he’s also asked his national security adviser to look into what happened at the lab and to make recommendations.
“We know… that increasingly, countries like China and others are trying to either influence or get secrets out of our country, and that’s why we have to continue to be extraordinarily vigilant… to keep our research institutions safe,” said Trudeau.
He then turned his attention to Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, who held a press conference earlier in the day alongside MPs James Bezan, the national defence critic, and Michael Chong, the party’s foreign affairs critic.
Poilievre Accuses Trudeau of Cover-Up
During that news conference, Poilievre accused Trudeau of allowing China to “infiltrate” Canada and covering it up by delaying the release of the documents.
He repeated claims that China backed the re-election of a liberal minority government in 2021. A public inquiry will resume next month to investigate the breadth of Chinese interference in Canada’s past two federal elections.
Last Updated on by Nikita Pradhan
