| Regrets, Cancer and the Poetry of Haiyan Zhang Regrets, the type of regrets that ordinary people have when they inadvertently alter the course of another person’s life for what they believe is for the worse, I have had a few. You know one that still haunts me to this day if you have read An Appalling Indiscretion. Haiyan Zhang met her future husband in Kuwait where she was covering the first Gulf War for Xinhua, China's state-run news service. After marrying him she gave up a promising career and moved to Canada for an even brighter future. In Canada, after completing a Master's Degree in Business Administration, she was recruited by the federal government and worked for the Privy Council Office (PCO). A clerical error led to an unnecessary application for Top Secret Clearance on her behalf, and as a result she was terminated from her position. The government’s excuse for firing her: she had worked as a Chinese journalist and had attended receptions co-hosted by the Chinese Embassy and the Canadian Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, implying a vague possibility she could be involved in intelligence collection for some unnamed foreign country. A deplorable irony, the information used against her was freely volunteered by Haiyan and not the result of “due-diligence” by bureaucrats tasked with investigating her. The ignominy of being dismissed from the federal government on bogus espionage charges where even people from your own community now shun you may not have been as hard to bear as the knowledge of the unwarranted guilt her husband felt for having brought her to Canada in the first place. Haiyan has almost exhausted her avenues of redress before people who sit in judgement, who only pay lip service to justice, if even that where senior government officials or government Ministers are concerned. She is not getting justice for herself, but she will try getting justice for others. She is starting law school this fall. That is the type of person she is. She is passionate about democracy and helping victims of abusive management. Her passions are reflected in her volunteer work with organizations such as Canadians for Accountability of which she is a founding member. She called to remind me of the annual meeting of Canadians for Accountability. When she heard that L. had had, what we hope is a successful battle with cancer, sent us some timely, knowing poetry. Bernard Payeur, July 1, 2011 P. S. My postings about Haiyan Zhang does not mean or imply that she agrees with the opinions expressed on my website.
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