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Was it a mistake, the work of a “rogue” visa officer, or a hidden government agenda to target a controversial telecommunications corporation?

As a tense diplomatic standoff continues between Canada and China, two immigration experts are again pondering an unusual sequence of events that saw three of their Chinese clients denied permanent residence here because they belonged to an organization involved in espionage.

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That organization appeared to be Huawei Technologies, their employer.

The decisions — each made by the same officer in Canada’s Hong Kong consulate in the space of a few days — were eventually reversed and all three are now living in Canada. But the episode raises questions about how the federal government treats would-be immigrants linked to a company that has long battled accusations it spies for China — and yet employs hundreds of Canadians.

“All in all, it was just a pretty strange type of refusal,” said Victor Lum, a former Canadian visa officer himself whose company at the time, Well Trend United, represented the trio.