Canada’s visa office in Beijing staffed mostly by Chinese police-owned company Bookmark Please log in to listen to this story. Also available in French and Mandarin. Log In Create Free Account
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Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press
Most of the people working at Canada’s visa application centre in China’s capital city are directly employed by a police-owned company, the federal government says.
Fourteen per cent of the staff in the Beijing centre work for VFS Global, the company paid to run Canada’s visa centres abroad. The remainder – 86 per cent – are employees of Beijing Shuangxiong Foreign Service Co., a subcontractor owned by the Beijing Public Security Bureau, according to a written response to questions from Michèle LaRose, spokesperson for Public Services and Procurement Canada.
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Markus Schreiber/The Associated Press
A key parliamentary committee has voted to call VFS Global, the company that runs Canada’s visa application centres abroad, to answer questions regarding Chinese police ownership of the facility in Beijing.
The House of Commons committee on citizenship and immigration unanimously agreed to adopt a motion from NDP immigration critic Jenny Kwan on Wednesday asking VFS to appear no later than Feb. 24.
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The Canadian government is facing calls to cancel an arrangement in Beijing where Chinese police own a company that collects details of people applying for visas to Canada.
As The Globe and Mail reported earlier this week, Canada’s visa application centre in Beijing is operated by Beijing Shuangxiong Foreign Service Company, which is owned by the Beijing Municipal Public Security Bureau. And at least some of the people working inside the centre are members of the Chinese Communist Party, recruited from a school that trains the next generation of party elite.
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