MONTREAL, Sept 30 (AFP) - The Canadian government said Thursday it would not hand over 44 North Koreans who entered the Canadian embassy compound in Beijing to the Chinese authorities.
Canadian foreign ministry spokeswoman Kimberly Phillips told AFP "the group will remain in the compound for the time being." She added that Canadian officials were interviewing the North Koreans.
China has asked Canada to hand over the men, women and six children who climbed the walls of the embassy compound on Wednesday.
"We continue to work with the Chinese government to resolve this issue along the line of past resolutions," Phillips said.
Previously, Canadian officials have accompanied North Korean asylum seekers out of China. They usually go to the South Korea after a short stay in a third country. Two North Koreans entered the Canadian embassy in May 2002 and two more one month later.
But Canadian government sources said no speedy resolution to the new embassy invasion should be expected, especially as a major national holidays is about to start in China.
Canadian authorities have installed special facilities, including showers, have been installed for the asylum-seekers.
Several hundred North Koreans, fleeing the tough social and political conditions in the Stalinist state, have entered diplomatic missions in Beijing and other cities in the past two years.
China has said the latest 44 should leave the Canadian embassy.
"We hope they will hand them over to China," Assistant Foreign Minister Shen Guofang told reporters in Beijing, promising to deal with the group in a "humanitarian" spirit.
"We think that rushing into embassies threatens the security of embassies in China and we need to condemn this practice," he said.
China does not recognise North Koreans fleeing their country as refugees insisting they are economic migrants.
Many North Koreans caught by Chinese authorities are sent back to their homeland, where, human rights groups say, some are executed.
Joseph Caron, the Canadian ambassador in Beijing, told CTV television in an interview: "The fact of the matter is there have been many such cases here in Beijing and even other parts of China as well.
"There is an element of routine in this in a sense. This group is a bit larger than what we have seen in other cases, so we have to adapt to that."
In its relations with China, Canada has sought to balance its calls for improved human rights and its commercial contacts.
Earlier this year, Prime Minister Paul Martin ignored Beijing's warnings and received the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan spiritual leader.
Canada also wants to sell more of its Candu nuclear reactors to China, which is also the main client for Canadian wheat.