Hydro-Quebec employee accused of spying for Chinese Communist Party

Quebec has one of the greatest resources, hydroelectricity, which serves millions of households in North America. Hydro-Québec, Canada's renewable energy giant, has been under surveillance by China for many years.

Last Tuesday, we learned that this government monopoly was allegedly spied upon by the former 35-year-old employee, Yuesheng Wang, in the interests of China.

Mr. Wang, a researcher with Hydro-Québec since 2018, was arrested this past Monday by the RCMP. He has been charged and taken to court for economic espionage.

He has since been detained until his trial because of the high risk of escape.

Mr. Wang worked in the electrification of energy transport and storage at Hydro-Québec. Industrial secrets highly coveted by China. There is great interest in storing energy, especially solar and wind, in solid batteries, and China is looking forward to these cutting-edge studies by Hydro-Québec.

It seems that it was difficult to know what was going on since Mr. Wang was teleworking until recently during the pandemic.

Yet the Quebec media focused heavily on the fact that Mr. Yuesheng does not speak French or English. Many were outraged to learn that this former employee was able to occupy a position within the company when one of the major hiring criteria is knowledge of the French language.

Can we come back to earth for a moment? This man would have been spied on for China to the detriment of Canada. We do not yet know the extent of the information that was stolen and transmitted. And the Quebec media are offended by the language a person speaks?

How can an industry as important as Hydro-Québec, with such crucial information, be left in the hands of an employee who's teleworking? A man who had no security clearance because he had access to strategic intelligence. It is almost a question of offering everything, on a silver platter, to all countries that want to spy on Canada.

Mr. Wang, a specialist in batteries, also worked in partnership with HiNa Battery Technology, a Chinese company, which invests in the creation of future batteries for electric vehicles. Wang also mentioned that he received funding through the Chinese Communist Party, “Thousand Talents Program” for one of these projects in this Chinese company.

Tina Zhu, a representative of the Canada-China Friendship Association, claims that this affects the relationship between the two countries. In her defence, Yuesheng Wang’s girlfriend said, “I swore that I had no formal connection with the Chinese government, apart from the fact that she sometimes invited diplomats to her association’s activities.”

It’s not in fact, to say that they have links in the political sphere? China may have a lot of information about all countries in the world, this is just one of many events that we may or may not discover!

Remember that there are several clandestine Chinese police stations across multiple countries in the world.

And what happens to these two Chinese researchers, suspected of spying, who were escorted from high-level laboratories in Winnipeg?

All this is as the result of several open cases involving the invasion of China into Canada. But of course, the Trudeau government is not spreading more information at that level.