Australia’s latest confrontation over a Chinese diplomat’s tweet?
What do I think of Australia and China’s latest confrontation over a Chinese diplomat’s tweet?
By Godfree Roberts – I publish the newsletter, HereComesChina.com
December 2020 Quora
I am an Australian and I think China’s complaints are well grounded. Furthermore, the Australian (and Western) media refused to discuss China’s complaints–or even publish them–which suggests a guilty conscience.
This article from the weekly newsletter, Here Comes China explains their embarrassed silence:
Australia’s leaders and media have vilified, calumniated, and threatened the PRC since I was a boy, but their current behavior is so egregious that China has pointed out our worst offenses:
- Foreign investment decisions, with acquisitions blocked on opaque national security grounds in contravention of ChAFTA. Since 2018, more than 10 Chinese investment projects have been rejected by Australia citing ambiguous and unfounded “national security concerns” and restricting areas like infrastructure, agriculture and animal husbandry.
- Banning Huawei Technologies and ZTE from the 5G network, over unfounded national security concerns, doing the bidding of the US by lobbying other countries, foreign interference legislation viewed as targeting China and in the absence of evidence.
- Politicization and stigmatization of the normal exchanges and cooperation between China and Australia and creating barriers and imposing restrictions, including the revocation of visas for Chinese scholars.
- Calling for an international independent inquiry into the COV1D-19 virus, as a political manipulation echoing the US attack on China.
- Incessant wanton interference in China’s Xinjiang, Hong Kong, and Taiwan affairs.
- Spearheading the crusade against China in multilateral forums
- The first non littoral country to make a statement on the South China Sea to the United Nations, siding with the US’ anti-China campaign
- Spreading disinformation imported from the US around China’s efforts of containing COV1D-19.
- Legislating scrutiny of agreements with a foreign government targeting China and aiming to torpedo Victoria’s participation in B&R
- Providing funding to anti-China think tanks for spreading untrue reports, peddling lies around Xinjiang and so-called China infiltration aimed at manipulating public opinion against China
- Early dawn search and reckless seizure of Chinese journalists’ homes and properties without charges or explanations
- Thinly veiled allegations against China of cyber attacks without any evidence
- Outrageous condemnation of the governing party of China by NGOs
- Racist attacks against Chinese and Asian people.
- Unfriendly and antagonistic reports on China by media that poison the atmosphere of bilateral relations
Between 2015-2020, China lowered tariffs on Australian products for six consecutive years. Ninety-five percent of the products we sell to China now enjoy zero tariffs. On Singles Day alone, 2,000 Australian businesses sold over US$720 million worth of goods to Chinese customers in 24 hours–yet the Australian government has been politicizing trade and investment issues, and constantly violating market principles by discriminating against Chinese companies.
Since 2018, it has rejected a dozen Chinese investment programs on the pretext of ‘national security concerns,’ rejections that led directly to large Chinese losses. Even more significantly, it banned Chinese companies from 5G network construction, citing spurious ‘national security’ threats. It initiated one-hundred six anti-dumping and anti-subsidy investigations of Chinese products, compared to four such Chinese cases on goods from Australia.
China sees a pattern of bad-faith dealings, negative discrimination, and unprovoked hostility and, lest others emulate us, has chosen to air its grievances.
Neither our government nor media has offered a reasoned defence, “The 14 items identified by the Chinese embassy document are seen by the Department of Foreign Affairs as key to Australia’s national interest and non-negotiable”. DFAT said the government makes “sound decisions in our national interest and in accordance with our values and open democratic processes”.
In other words, they have no defense and, once again, Australia is behaving like an international thug, as it also did with East Timor. But China is not East Timor.
Motives for Australia’s “Behavior”
- Stupidity. Australian politicians are dysfunctional, amoral, heartless, professional liars. They are self-destructive, other-destructive sociopaths. Cunningly stupid, attentive to personal advancement and heedless of their society, they have repeatedly jettisoned their country’s collective future–NBN, defense, 5G–for personal advancement.
- Ignorance. Most of them know less than nothing about China, thanks to Australia’s foreign-controlled media; an academy poisoned by religious nutters like B.A. Santamaria and Simon Leys; and security services and think tanks beholden to foreign powers. How many Australians know that there are more hungry children, drug addicts, suicides and executions, more homeless, poor, and imprisoned people in America than in China? Or that China is one of the top three democracies, a leader in human rights, and overmatches the US militarily? Or that it will grow its economy by $2.4 trillion next year, more than the entire world combined?
- Racism. As the great 20th century thinker Gavin McGregor observed, racism changes our collective thinking. While not an overt premise (whoever says, ‘in this situation we should apply our racial prejudice’?), it changes what is ‘logical’. Vide Australia’s treatment of their Aboriginal athlete, Adam Goodes. Chinese Australian friends report one hundred racist incidents each month, of which ninety-nine are ignored. Aussies are as racist as the Boers but lack their refreshing bluntness, so we deny that we are repelled by the thought of being led by slanty-eyed people.
- Factionalism. Logic, commonsense, and national self-preservation are irrelevant to those whose only concern is funding reelections and who have always employed foreign threats to justify their advancement and our immiseration.
- Capitalism. Russia’s ancient tradition of economic incompetence doomed its socialism, but China’s sophisticated governance threatens the global capitalists who control our banks, media, and militaries and which our governments have always served.
The Future
Our future appears bleak, since it is inextricably bound to America’s, and America is collapsing.
What is to be Done?
As in the US, there is little to choose between our major political parties. The only interesting political party on earth right now is in China, and I urge readers to study the Chinese government’s statements closely because it is the only party that keeps its promises and does not lie to its people.
Joel Huan
The Mystery of Ephraim 