Trump’s Iran Test

This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

The New York Sun

After all the breast-beating from the liberals about how no one in America is above the law, how heartwarming are the protests in the anti-Trump press about the arrest in Canada of the Red Chinese telecoms magnate Meng Wanzhou, who has been likened to Facebook’s Sheryl Sandberg. Now Mrs. Meng is out on $7.5 million bail in Vancouver and wearing an ankle bracelet pending extradition to America.

In transit at a Canadian airport, the telecom tycoon — vice chairman of Huawei — was seized on an American warrant for fraud and violations of the sanctions against Iran. The New York Times promptly published a piece by two ex-aides to President Obama, characterizing the arrest as a “diplomatic curveball” and fretting that it could complicate America’s trade talks with the Red Chinese.

The Financial Times calls the arrest “undoubtedly an incendiary step, escalating trade tensions with Beijing.” America and its western allies, the FT reckons, “have legitimate concerns about China’s reputation for digital espionage and theft of intellectual property.” But the FT argues that “arresting a star of Chinese business” on a “Canadian stopover” is “not the way to persuade Beijing to change its behavior.”

“Despicable hooliganism” is how the Washington Post quotes the tabloid Global Times, published by the Red Chinese People’s Daily, as describing the arrest of Mrs. Meng. And the Toronto, Canada, Star casts doubt on America’s good word, editorializing that “it’s hard to accept that this was a totally hands-off move by the Trump Justice Department.”

To those who worry that the arrest of Mrs. Meng will disrupt progress on more important matters, the correct address for relief is the White House. The Constitution grants President Trump plenty of powers, including the pardon, to let Mrs. Meng go if there are any national interests that supersede vigorous enforcement in the case. No one has made that case yet.

Our own view is that American sanctions against Iran deserve to be vigorously enforced. President Trump stood for — and got elected — president in good part on his promise to end the appeasement of the ayatollahs. Congress enacted the sanctions that now obtain against the Islamic regime at Tehran. We see the Huawei case as a test of just how seriously the Iran sanctions are going to be taken at home and abroad in the Trump era.


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