The Australian chief of the Port of Darwin’s Chinese owner is warning the potential scrapping of its 99-year lease threatens to deter foreign investment, denouncing the treatment dished out to the company as the worst he has seen a multinational endure.

In the company’s strongest response to a high-level review of the deal, Landbridge Group Australia managing director Mike Hughes lashed the sideline critics who “carp about the lease”, arguing at no point had security officials formally raised any concerns over the firm’s operation of the port.