In that case, HSBC should be held liable for damages and should sue the party in order to recover them. If they cannot recover damages in that jurisdiction then they should either stop operating there or stop operating in the US.

It's pretty much indefensible to me that someone that has nothing to do with the US operating outside the US would be tried in the US for a crime they allegedly commited elsewhere.

FWIW HSBC has also 'actively circumvented rules designed to “block transactions involving terrorists, drug lords, and rogue regimes.”'. I don't see their CFOs arrested.

Then there's the question of Banco do Brasil, Bank of America, Bank of Guam, Bank of Moscow, Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi, Barclays, BNP Paribas, Clearstream Banking, Commerzbank, Compass, Crédit Agricole, Deutsche Bank, HSBC, ING, Intesa Sanpaolo, JP Morgan Chase, National Bank of Abu Dhabi, National Bank of Pakistan, PayPal, RBS (ABN Amro), Société Générale, Toronto-Dominion Bank, Trans-Pacific National Bank, Standard Chartered, and Wells Fargo all transacting with Iran (https://archive.is/kyKGf) and not having their CFOs arrested.

>In that case, HSBC should be held liable for damages

I've no love for HSBC (at all) but in this instance it appears they are the victim of fraudulent representations made by Huawei.

Your "solution" proposes prosecuting not only an innocent party, but one of the victims? That's an ... ummm ... interesting take.

Well no, that is not my solution. That is the only ethical way the US could enforce sanctions. The solution would be to put the Iran deal back up, but I digress.

Yes, there is absolutely no way of enforcing sanctions without prosecuting innocent parties. The only way that the US can get foreign banks not to deal with Iran is by punishing them, even if they were the victims of fraud, the bank would then have to decide if they want to continue operating in the US and try to recoup their losses by going after the fraudster, not operate in the jurisdiction of the fraudster if that is impossible, or not deal with Iran at all (in which case a competitor will). Otherwise, they can also stop dealing with the US.

>even if they were the victims of fraud, the bank would then have to decide if they want to continue operating in the US and try to recoup their losses by going after the fraudster

So you're proposing that the government shouldn't prosecute fraud criminally, and it should be up to the banks go after the perpetrators in civil court instead?

No, I think that the local government where the fraud happened should pursue criminal charges if appropriate, not the US government.

You can be suef in civil and criminal court at the same time.

How does this square with jurisdictions that don't enforce those laws because the crimes benefit them? Should russian cybercriminals who victimize americans be allowed go to whatever country they please, knowing that they won't be prosecuted in their home country (because the government turns a blind eye to their activities), and can't be prosecuted/extradited in whatever country they travel to?

In this case neither perpetrator nor victim of the fraud appear to be US entities, so your example of Russian cybercriminals victimizing Americans doesn't exactly apply. Unless the country requesting the extradition of said Russian from Canada is, dunno, Australia, for some unrelated beef they have, using the crime against Americans as a convenient excuse.

But in this case, the US entity is being victimized. Specifically, they were tricked into violating US sanctions, which can carry criminal penalties for them. I guess you argue that we can simply decriminalize this for the US entity, but that opens a huge loophole for bypassing sanctions. Say you're china and you want to buy some American semiconductors (which are currently banned from being sold into china). All you need to do is set up a company in Russia, buy the semiconductors, promise that they won't be later transferred into china (wink wink), then import it into china.

Bank may not be an US entity is what it appears. Also the bank is supposed to do due diligence. Careful reading of the judgement, indicate that none of the liabilities from the transaction are possibly active, ie, all payments have been made and the matter closed, with no issue of defaults, etc. The question being considered is the 'risk of reputational damage to the bank', which does it sound like a criminal matter?

In that case you stop doing business in that jurisdiction.

But they have everything to do with the US, that is the problem. They have multiple divisions with multiple agreements. Phone components, systems, software, all under export controls and they aren't abiding by the agreements they have signed. I'm not sure where you're going with this. How do they have nothing to do with the US?

Then go after Huawei, which is an entity operating in the US? But that is not what happened; Huawei is not being sued, an individual that never dealt with a US entity is being sued for an alleged crime between non-US entities outside the US.

>Then go after Huawei, which is an entity operating in the US? But that is not what happened; Huawei is not being sued

They're not being sued, but they are being charged with:

> Conspiracy to Defraud the United States, Bank Fraud, and Theft of Trade Secrets Among Nearly Two Dozen Charges

https://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/chinese-telecom-firm-huawei...

Good, then you can leave the individual non-US citizen that is outside of the US and did not commit a crime in the United States outside of US Court.

When someone commits fraud remotely, it is often recognized in the location where the fraud occurred, not where it originated from. It doesn't matter if you're hacking a bank computer, lying through misrepresented paperwork, or any other form of fraud or remote crime. And when businesses do business internationally, their execs can be held accountable for crimes their businesses do.

Here's a different but similar example:

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/09/business/volkswagen-diese...

This is completely different. Volkswagen directly lied to the US government. And even then, Germany refused extradition for very good reasons, they had to wait for him to go to the US.

This was someone allegedly defrauding an entity that is not American, let alone the US Government, outside of US jurisdiction, being deported to a jurisdiction in which they committed no crime. It is entirely ridiculous to equivocate the two cases.

Branches of HSBC inside of the US definitely operate under US law. It is illegal to defraud banks in the US. It is also illegal to defraud banks in Canada.

She did not commit a crime in the US, correct.

What she did do was come to Canada after committing what is certainly a crime in both Canada and the US. If you commit a crime elsewhere and then come to Canada, you can, and should be held accountable. Many, many criminals have been prosecuted here, or extradited from here, for crimes that weren't committed here.

We're not just talking about bank fraud (that just happened to be the easiest thing to pin on her for the purpose of extradition). Huawei has long been known in intelligence circles for stealing Canadian IP as well. At the very, very least, she is complicit in such crimes. I'm glad the US is doing something about it, since we (Canada) don't have the international clout needed to stand up to Chinese bullying.

Yes, she committed a crime against the US outside its' jurisdiction. She then made the mistake of coming to Canada, after having committed what would be considered a crime in Canada. Make no mistake. Aside from the sanctions violations, most of the allegations Huawei is facing also apply to Canada. She shouldn't have come here. Now she needs to face the music.

You're equivocating the word "in". She allegedly committed something that is a crime in Canadian and US law, but she did not commit it in US jurisdiction, nor against a US entity. As such, there is no reason for her to be extradited to the US. I don't care that it was against the US, if it was outside of US jurisdiction then the US has no business prosecuting anyone.

Just because what she did is against US interests doesn't mean that the US has the right to judge her according to their own laws. That is entirely ridiculous.

As a Canadian citizen, I would feel that it would be 100% justified for her to be extradited to the jurisdiction in which she committed the alleged crime. But we aren't talking about this.

>nor against a US entity

Sigh. You didn't read the link I provided you over three hours ago, did you?

C'mon, be honest :)

> The Eastern District of New York charged Huawei, two of its affiliates, and Chief Financial Officer Meng Wanzou with 13 counts surrounding the company’s misrepresentations to the U.S. government and four financial institutions regarding its business in Iran. The indictment charges that the company used financial institutions operating in the United States to process transactions involving millions of dollars in furtherance of Huawei’s Iran-based business.

Emphasis is mine. Quote is from the link I previously provided you -

https://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/chinese-telecom-firm-huawei...

That page has other interesting links at the bottom you should also read. Here's a quote from one (again, all emphasis is mine).

> According to the indictment, Huawei relied on its global banking relationships for banking services that included processing U.S.-dollar transactions through the United States. U.S. laws and regulations generally prohibited these banks from processing transactions related to Iran through the United States. The banks could have faced civil or criminal penalties for processing transactions that violated U.S. laws or regulations. Relying on the repeated misrepresentations by Huawei, these banks continued their banking relationships with Huawei. One bank cleared more than $100 million worth of Skycom-related transactions through the United States between 2010 and 2014.

Here's the best part:

> In furtherance of this scheme to defraud, and as alleged in the indictment, Huawei and its principals repeatedly lied to U.S. government authorities about Huawei’s business in Iran in submissions to the U.S. government, and in responses to government inquiries. For example, Huawei provided false information to the U.S. Congress regarding whether Huawei’s business in Iran violated any U.S. law. Similarly, as indicated in the indictment, in 2007 — months before Huawei orchestrated the purported sale of Skycom to another Huawei-controlled entity — Huawei’s founder falsely stated to FBI agents that Huawei did not have any direct dealings with Iranian companies and that Huawei operated in compliance with all U.S. export laws.

And this is a series of crimes actually committed on U.S. soil:

> In 2017, when Huawei became aware of the government’s investigation, Huawei and its subsidiary Huawei USA allegedly tried to obstruct the investigation by making efforts to move witnesses with knowledge about Huawei’s Iran-based business to the PRC, and beyond the jurisdiction of the U.S. government, and by concealing and destroying evidence of Huawei’s Iran-based business that was located in the United States.

The above three blockquotes are from: https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/chinese-telecommunications-co...

That just covers the Iran related part. Do you want me to go through the stolen trade secrets part? Okay sure, here goes. Once again, emphasis is mine:

> According to the indictment, in 2012 Huawei began a concerted effort to steal information on a T-Mobile phone-testing robot dubbed “Tappy.” In an effort to build their own robot to test phones before they were shipped to T-Mobile and other wireless carriers, Huawei engineers violated confidentiality and non-disclosure agreements with T-Mobile by secretly taking photos of “Tappy,” taking measurements of parts of the robot, and in one instance, stealing a piece of the robot so that the Huawei engineers in China could try to replicate it. After T-Mobile discovered and interrupted these criminal activities, and then threatened to sue, Huawei produced a report falsely claiming that the theft was the work of rogue actors within the company and not a concerted effort by Huawei corporate entities in the United States and China. As emails obtained in the course of the investigation reveal, the conspiracy to steal secrets from T-Mobile was a company-wide effort involving many engineers and employees within the two charged companies.

> As part of its investigation, FBI obtained emails revealing that in July 2013, Huawei offered bonuses to employees based on the value of information they stole from other companies around the world, and provided to Huawei via an encrypted email address.

So, tell me again how Meng, as CFO of this wonderful company, didn't do anything against a US entity?

She's an elected officer of the company, and thus under US Law and most countries for the matter. She as an individual was a part of and oversaw the actions and complaints alleged. There's no ambiguity at all.

Then prosecute her under the country where she allegedly committed fraud.