Chinese loans worth hundreds of billions of dollars are saddling Australia's smaller regional neighbours with unsustainable debts and giving Beijing crucial economic leverage to gain strategic and military power, warns a new independent report presented to the US State Department.
The American report by Harvard University researchers identifies 16 states vulnerable to China's so-called "debtbook diplomacy" and economic coercion, including Vanuatu, the Philippines, Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Tonga and Micronesia.
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John Kehoe is economics editor at Parliament House, Canberra. He writes on economics, politics and business. John was Washington correspondent covering Donald Trump’s first election. He joined the Financial Review in 2008 from Treasury. Connect with John on Twitter. Email John at jkehoe@afr.com
