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“The return of inadmissible persons is a normal part of the bilateral relationship with any country. Nothing has changed with this policy since the change in government in 2015,” said Nicholas Dorion of the Canada Border Services Agency. A working group of Chinese and Canadian officials has been meeting regularly on “common law-enforcement issues, including the return of Chinese fugitives to China,” since 1999.

Documents obtained with an access to information request show prime minister Stephen Harper told Chinese leadership in 2014 that he was eager to collaborate on the return of fugitives. China’s ambassador to Canada at the time, Luo Zhaohui, praised the fact that Harper “stressed that Canada has no intention to ‘harbour fugitives’ ” in a Globe and Mail op-ed published that November.

The deputy minister of foreign affairs at the time, Daniel Jean, said in a 2015 memorandum: “It is in Canada’s interest to have such persons removed.”

In 2015, numbers reached a 10-year high of 43. The lowest number of returned fugitives over the last 10 years was 18, in 2010. The average number was 33. Over the decade of data, 13 people are also listed as having been “removed to China” who did not have Chinese citizenship.

The “criminality” statistics do not say what crimes people were accused of, but immigration cases would fall under a different category, according to a former diplomat.

Engagement with China on this issue included a meeting in June 2015 between Jean and the head of China’s national bureau of corruption prevention, vice-minister Fu Kui. The meeting was not made public.