Report from parliamentary committee lands amid new appointment atop National Microbiology Lab

Karen Pauls · CBC News · Posted: Nov 19, 2024

The new head of the National Microbiology Lab (NML) in Winnipeg has some homework to do before taking over the high-security facility — starting with a long-awaited parliamentary committee report that recommends immediately ending all government-funded research in sensitive areas with people or entities from within China.

Dr. Jean Longtin, who was with Quebec's Ministry of Health during the COVID-19 pandemic, will in January take over the lab that prompted the recommendations after two of its scientists were fired and stripped of their security clearances amid concerns about Chinese espionage.

Ending collaborations with China in sensitive areas of study — including artificial intelligence, robotics, life sciences, weapons and energy technology, digital infrastructure, surveillance, aerospace and satellites — was one of the 12 recommendations in the report by the Special Committee on the Canada-People's Republic of China Relationship.

"I would encourage [Longtin] to read the report," Michael Chong, Conservative foreign affairs critic and member of the committee, told CBC News.

"I think the leadership at the lab… needs to understand that they are a critical part of protecting Canada's national security," he said.

That's in part, he says, because of its role preventing pandemics and other major health crises, but also because a lot of technology at the NML "can be weaponized against Canada by states that are hostile to Canada's interests and to our citizens."

Simmering scandal

The NML is currently the only Level 4 biosafety lab in the country that can handle the most dangerous viruses.

In 2019, two Chinese Canadian researchers, Xiangguo Qiu and her husband Keding Cheng were escorted out of the facility and later fired, raising questions and igniting a scandal that has simmered for years.

According to an assessment by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), part of a trove of documents released in February, Qui "intentionally" shared scientific knowledge and materials with China in order to benefit its government "and herself, without regard for the implications to her employer or to Canada's interests."

Those documents also say the couple didn't disclose professional relationships and collaborations with Chinese researchers and institutions, and brought employees from a Chinese entity "whose work is not aligned with Canadian interests" into the NML. The two scientists have never been reached for comment.

The committee's report says a ban is needed because of China's "increasingly assertive" efforts to build up its military and scientific might, sometimes through espionage.

"While international collaboration to advance scientific knowledge for the benefit of humanity is important, it does not supersede the need for the government to protect the national security of Canada," it said.

Chong says some Chinese organizations "should be completely off limits for any partnerships" — including the National University of Defence Technology, which conducts research into military technologies.

Christian Leuprecht, a professor and expert in security and defence at the Royal Military College and Queen's University in Kingston, Ont., agrees the report should be mandatory reading "because it makes people realize how easy it was to infiltrate the lab."

Taxpayer-funded research should never end up in the hands of adversarial countries or institutions which can "weaponize that research against our interests," he said.

Complicated process

But some university researchers say decoupling research with another country is complicated.

Hans-Joachim Wieden is a microbiologist at the University of Manitoba, where Qiu and Cheng had academic appointments. He's the university's associate vice-president (research and international), in charge of partnerships and innovation and overseeing the Office of Research Security, which watches for troubling relationships and advises on security precautions.

"If we curtail, for instance, a collaboration with a particular country or certain institution that was OK a while ago, then that research group has a problem with maintaining their research momentum, their research program, their career trajectory, and even the people that are working in this research lab," he said. "So this needs to be very carefully done."

Wieden says the university already complies with restrictions that were introduced by Ottawa last January, barring government-funded researchers from collaborating with people affiliated with a list of about 100 organizations — mostly in China, Russia and Iran.

Those restrictions followed the 2022 National Security Guidelines for Research Partnerships, which help researchers, research organizations and federal granting agencies identify and mitigate potential national security risks associated with private-sector partnerships.

The university is developing training to educate researchers about the security implications of their work and make them aware it could be exploited, but Wieden said it's not mandatory. The issue will also be part of discussions at the Canadian Science Policy Conference in Ottawa this week.

The federal Liberal government has until early March to respond to the parliamentary committee's report.

A spokesperson from the Department of Innovation, Science and Economic Development says international collaboration is essential for furthering scientific development, which is why Ottawa established measures to protect Canadian innovations while still differentiating between the actions of foreign governments and the people and businesses of those countries.

The Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC), which runs the NML, and Public Safety Canada say they will also contribute to the government's response.

Longtin is currently at the CHU de Québec-Université Laval where he has served as the associate medical director – OPTILAB national capital since 2022. Before that, he was medical director of the Quebec Public Health Laboratory from 2015 to 2019, then special adviser to the Quebec National Director of Public Health from 2020 to 2024.

He will "bring his strong clinical experience and government leadership to our team as he leads the laboratory activities and further advances the NML's scientific agenda," PHAC said in a statement to CBC News.