IT WAS just a piece of cardboard, the leftover packaging of a double bed mattress, but it helped light a fire that continues to smoulder at Queensland’s premier university.

Dotted with colourful Post-it notes, the cardboard was one of scores of displays spilling out on the lawns of the University of Queensland’s St Lucia campus on Market Day, the day students sign up to clubs that add zest to uni life.

But Christy Leung’s mind was not on the rowing club but 7000km away in her home of Hong Kong, which was in the grip of protests sparked by legislation that would allow for Hongkongers to be extradited to China.

The 21-year-old in her third year of a hospitality and tourism management degree grabbed some sticky notes and pens and, with some friends, turned the cardboard into what is known as a Lennon Wall, a place to put messages of support for a cause.

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About 100m away, a 20-year-old firebrand and virgin protest organiser, Drew Pavlou, was leading a group of about 40 students under the sandstone archways of the Great Court.

The philosophy and history scholar had been following the persecution of China’s Uyghur people, a Muslim minority in Xinjiang, and the Hong Kong protests, with increasing anger.

Convinced the Chinese Government was to blame for both, Pavlou’s crew wanted the Beijing-funded Confucius Institute operating out of the university closed.

They stopped under the arches and Pavlou started chanting into a megaphone.

And then it was on. The next few hours of July 24 unleashed a volatility not seen on the campus for years.

Chinese loyalists disrupted both groups, punches were thrown, Pavlou’s tooth was chipped, Leung’s cardigan ripped and police called.

A UQ investigation is now being considered by the Academic Registrar.

Pan out from the fracas and the bigger picture shows a confluence of events influencing that day and those since. China and the US facing off in a trade war.

Australia desperate to be friends with both. Liberal MP Andrew Hastie, the head of Federal Parliament’s intelligence committee, causing ripples with warnings the world is not fully awake to China’s rise, just as France failed to see the might of Nazi Germany. Hong Kong’s chaos deepening.

Caught in the mix are the Australian universities that have come to rely on the stream of Chinese students paying full price for degrees; a financial gamble fuelled by years of dwindling federal funding and taken to maintain research standards, a benchmark of a world-class university.

Last month, the Centre for Independent Studies released a report saying UQ and six universities in other states were overexposed to high levels of financial risk in relying on China.

Vice-chancellors and the Federal Education Minister, Dan Tehan, are formulating plans to protect sensitive university research from foreign governments, particularly China. And there are moves for universities to liaise more closely with national security agencies over concerns of Chinese influence on campuses.

It’s a virulent brew that is infecting life on the UQ campus.

UQ’s Vice-Chancellor, Peter Hoj, says more Chinese students have reported feeling unsafe on campus. Pavlou and his supporters say their beef is not with the students but the Chinese Communist Party Government.

Leung and her friends say they just want to secure a future of a free and democratic Hong Kong.

In the days after July 24, the Student Union allowed the Hong Kong protesters to establish a permanent Lennon Wall in the food court.

Chinese loyalists objected, ripping down messages such as “Free Hong Kong” and “Fight for Democracy” on several occasions.

The Union offered them a nearby wall to stick posters on, celebrating China. And so began the face off at UQ’s Great Walls of China.

STIRRING THE MELTING POT

Wander the grounds of UQ and the multicultural nature of its student cohort is clear.

This is a melting pot, an entree to the world in which these young people will one day make their mark.

Half of the 18,000 foreign students come from China. That’s close to 17 per cent of the university student intake of 53,000.

They pay a premium to be here. Degree prices vary but Hoj says on average, a foreign student forks out about $120,000 for a three-year degree.

An Australian student pays about $30,000.

In 2017, that meant UQ earned more than $471 million from foreign students’ fees, with the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade putting the contribution foreign students Australia-wide make to the economy at $35 billion – the third largest after iron ore and coal.

Without them, Australians’ standard of education would falter.

“Instead of an Australian student looking at an international student and thinking, ‘What are you doing here?’,” says Hoj, “they should look to them and say, ‘Thank God you’re here, otherwise I wouldn’t be here or … I’d be in a mouldy cellar getting my lecture’.”

Hoj says the reliance on foreign students is a result of “many billions of dollars” being cut from universities’ coffers by federal governments over the past decade.

The percentage of Chinese students at UQ is slightly higher than he would like and diversifying the foreign intake is a priority.

Crunch time is coming: the number of Chinese seeking placements in Australian universities is already flattening out and “to be honest, we hadn’t foreseen the geopolitical tensions accelerate as fast as they have now between the world’s two superpowers”.

Making up another slab of the funding shortfall are research partnerships, many of them with multinationals and foreign governments. And on a smaller scale, there’s institutional partnerships.

Since 2009, UQ has had a Confucius Institute, which teaches Chinese language and culture. It’s a joint venture between the university – 12 other Australian universities have one, with hundreds around the globe – and Hanban, an agency of China’s education ministry which supplies funds, staff and resources.

The value of Chinese investment in UQ’s institute is not public.

Increasingly, CIs have been viewed by some China watchers as a threat to a university’s academic integrity and autonomy.

Some universities in the US, Canada and Europe have closed them, amid concerns they push a Chinese government agenda and silence talk about issues such as Tibet, Taiwan and the Tiananmen Square massacre.

Clive Hamilton, the author of Silent Invasion: China’s Influence in Australia, and a professor of public ethics at Canberra’s Charles Sturt University, says they are “arms of the Chinese Communist Party’s influence operations abroad” and backs the call by Paul Monk, a former head of China analysis at the Federal Government’s Defence Intelligence Organisation, for a public inquiry.

“China has a regime starkly different to our own in which these institutes are part of a systematic and strategic influence campaign,” says Monk.

Under UQ’s current agreement, now in renegotiation, UQ must accept the assessment of the CI on teaching matters.

Hoj says he cannot find any evidence that the university’s autonomy has been compromised.

That doesn’t wash with Pavlou.

“Should our university be taking money and fostering close ties with a government that is so, so hostile to human rights and so tyrannical in so many ways?” he asks.

It’s a moral question, he says, and one of national security.

That Hoj received an “outstanding individual” award from Hanban makes Pavlou angry.

UQ’s recent appointment of a serving diplomat, China’s consul-general to Brisbane, Dr Xu Jie, as an adjunct professor of language and culture makes him fume.

And so Pavlou publicised his sit-in on Facebook a few days ahead of July 24, in consultation with the Hong Kong Students’ Association (a separate entity to the group Leung is a part of, the Brisbane International Student Solidarity with Hong Kong).

Pavlou was keen to do the sit-in at the Confucius Institute but that was deemed too radical for Hong Kong students.

Trouble brewed the night before the protests. Dozens of what Pavlou calls “pro-CCP nationalist students” posted heated comments and he received death threats – “You must die dog stuff tonight”.

He hit back. “My stupid, dumb response was I googled some of the worst insults in Chinese and copied and pasted something I found,” he says.

So, when his group sat down on the Great Court walkway, the atmosphere was charged.

At first, the chant was “Hey, hey, ho, ho, Peter Hoj has got to go” through the megaphone.

But, says Pavlou, it was after the chant changed to ‘Hey, hey, ho, ho (Chinese president) Xi Jinping has got to go’ that “four people that were lurking around the edges came and assaulted us”.

Video shows a yet-unidentified man of Asian descent ripping the megaphone from Pavlou who jumps up and pushes him.

Then the man and another Asian man push Pavlou to the ground, hurting his ribs and head.

Within seconds, the Chinese national anthem is blaring from a ghetto-blaster.

Pavlou says his 40 supporters were quickly circled by about 200 Chinese loyalists chanting pro-China slogans and singing the anthem, with skirmishes breaking out over the next few minutes. His mob fired back with “Free Hong Kong” chants.

Pavlou believes the speed at which the opposing side gathered was suspicious.

“It seemed very, very co-ordinated,” he says, adding that the main four men appeared to be in their 30s.

“These people mobilised so quickly. I struggle to see how it could not have been organised by the consulate working with the Confucius Institute.”

Hoj says “you can’t necessarily assume that everyone who turns up to a protest at UQ is a student” but says he would not accept they were operatives of the Chinese government “without any evidence … we deal in fact, not innuendo”.

Security came to break up the protest, prompting Pavlou and about 20 others to head to the Confucius Institute to continue the sit-in while Hong Kong students joined Leung’s Solidarity group at their cardboard Lennon Wall.

More than 40 minutes later, Pavlou and others started receiving messages from Hong Kong friends.

“They were messaging us, saying, ‘Hey you guys, where are you, we need your help’,” says Pavlou.

The sit-in ended and the young protesters dashed off to the Lennon Wall.

FROG IN WATER STORY

Frenetic, loud, driven by business and teeming with funny, often rude, Cantonese. That’s how Phoebe Fann, 22, sees her home of Hong Kong and the way she wants it to stay. “I understand this unique culture, I’m so connected to this place,” she says.

Fann plans to return to the former British colony when she finishes her UQ communications degree at the end of this year, just like Leung, her flatmate. The two have been transfixed by the scenes of protests on Hong Kong streets, their allegiance with the young students who they say are fighting for their future. Says fellow Hongkonger, Andrew Lee, 24, who studies marine biology at UQ: “We have to think about what’s going to happen in 2047.” That’s the year Hong Kong’s special “one country, two systems” agreement expires and China decides the freewheeling territory’s future.

Lee says what began in March because of fears of the extradition bill – now withdrawn – has become much more. “It’s about democracy, it’s about police brutality, abuse of power and how the social system is so corrupted that we cannot do anything when we see something is wrong in the society.”

The trio believes China is steadily eroding Hong Kong’s character through mainland Chinese migration and the rise of Chinese companies in its finance sector. It’s the frog-in-boiling water story, says Fann. “Hong Kong is the frog and the government is trying to burn us gradually without us feeling pain.”

Keen to show their support for Hong Kong, the trio went to a few low-key sit-ins at UQ in June. Then they had the idea of a Lennon Wall. The original is in Prague, Czech Republic – a graffitied homage to John Lennon after his death in 1980 but used to promote many causes over the years. Hongkongers have adapted the concept, using sticky notes instead of paint. The UQ Hong Kong students got some cardboard and the mobile Lennon Wall began.

The morning of Market Day was relaxed, with students stopping at the Wall to ask about Hong Kong, many scribbling notes of support. Lee says a few mainland Chinese students were curious and struck up debates. Some objected to notes they believed were pro-independence but “we talked,” says Lee, “it was peaceful”.

That changed after the commotion of Pavlou’s protest. As the large crowd of 200 dispersed from the arches, it filtered back towards the stalls. Recalls Leung: “The first student came and said [in Mandarin] ‘All pro-independence people should die’. He starts giving out the sticky notes to other Chinese students and asks them to write pro-China messages on the wall.”

The Hongkongers let them. Says Leung: “That’s their freedom of speech, their right to do this.” Adds Lee: “We let them blast their national anthem, too, there’s no harm to anyone.”

Then things turned. “About 2.15, one of the Mandarin-speaking students came and kicked all of the posters in front of us,” says Leung. “I was holding a poster and he just ripped it and ripped my cardigan. I’m quite scared. Then the other Hong Kong students came to help me and tried to separate us.”

Footage of the resulting melee shows one of the pro-China people grabbing a Hong Kong supporter by the throat. Security arrives and a few minutes later, Pavlou and his crew turn up, calling out “Free Hong Kong”, joining the Hongkongers.

A stand-off ensued, with about 70 pro-Hong Kong supporters in the middle, ringed by 300 or more Chinese loyalists. “Constantly, part of the Chinese students try to agitate for a fight,” says Lee. “They point at us and say swear words in Mandarin and insult us and take photos of us. They say, ‘Come and fight me, bro’; they’re sort of aggressive. We definitely feel threatened. I keep telling people next to me, do not leave. If you are singled out, you get tailed, tragic will happen.”

Police arrived to negotiate. Fann says the pro-China leaders wanted an apology. “They talk about face, problems of (saving) face,” she says. The pro-Hong Kong side refused to apologise and with the pro-China group refusing to leave, police escorted the Hongkongers away about 40 minutes later. Before drifting off, Chinese loyalists gave patriotic speeches and sang the Chinese national anthem. (Attempts to contact the pro-China leaders were unsuccessful.)

A climate of distrust descended on UQ. The trio say their photographs were shared on Chinese social media sites, Weibo and WeChat, posted by those in the pro-China crowd. Fearing reprisals, Fann and Leung will not be photographed for this story without masks.

In the days after, Pavlou and other protesters received death threats. Pavlou says the China-based mother of a Chinese friend who was at the protests was visited by government officials and told to warn her son off any political dissent. A statement from the office of Xu, in his capacity as Brisbane’s Chinese Consul-General, praised the pro-China protesters’ “spontaneous patriotic behaviour”. Australia’s Foreign Minister, Marise Payne, said foreign interference in the exercise of free speech would not be tolerated.

UQ’s Great Walls of China remain. On ­August 9, a Chinese loyalist was challenged by UQ security guards at night in front of the Wall, holding a bunch of scrunched up posters. There’s video footage. When someone suggests the police be called, the man says, “Try call the police. I will call the ambassador.”

DIPLOMAT’S GIG A BAD IDEA

The spectrum of views among China watchers about the superpower’s place in Australia is as broad as the nation’s reach.

Hamilton and Monk warn of a stealthy infiltration of our institutions and politics with a view to changing our way of life. Others - such as James Laurenceson, the acting director of the Australia-China Relations Institute at Sydney’s University of Technology and Jane Golley, the director of the Australian Centre on China in the World at Canberra’s Australian National University – are less alarmed.

All of them think the appointment of a serving diplomat to an adjunct professorship at UQ was a bad idea.

Such an appointment feeds into China loyalists’ “sense of ownership and entitlement on the campus”, says Hamilton.

He was “most astonished” to hear the man who defaced the Lennon Wall say that he’d call the ambassador.

“What it illustrates is that for these men who were engaged in aggressive political activity on the university campus, permission to be on ­campus came not from the university but the Chinese ambassador,” says Hamilton. “I find that astounding.”

Laurenceson says most Chinese students are here to study and do not protest, let alone aggressively. But appointing a serving diplomat of any country to a role such as Xu’s is “absolutely problematic”.

“Their job is to prosecute their country’s interests,” he says. “It’s very hard to square with the university’s commitment to academic independence.”

Hoj says UQ has appointed serving diplomats from a range of countries to various roles in the past, without controversy. “(But) in this era of heightened geopolitical tensions, where Australia tries to balance its decisions strategically between two super powers, these appointments are seen through a totally different lens.”

Earlier this month, the UQ Senate resolved to stop appointing serving foreign officials to honorary or adjunct positions but existing appointments, including Xu’s, will remain.

Golley says that when Confucius Institutes arrived on the Australian scene 15 years ago, “the country was embracing the mission of engagement with China”.

Such engagement gave Australia its own “soft power”: educating thousands of Chinese in our ways and culture.

Now that “there is increasing fear, with some reason, about how China will use its power”, it’s time to reassess how Australian universities engage with China – in research, student numbers, Confucius Institutes.

But carefully, she cautions, because alienating Chinese research partnerships and students would be catastrophic.

“Get our houses in order, I’m not saying there’s nothing to think about here, but we need to think really carefully before we have kneejerk reactions that could decimate a whole bunch of universities.”

The Federal Government took steps towards a tidy-up late last month, with Education Minister Tehan announcing a federal taskforce with university representation would assess foreign interference at universities.

It will aim to improve cyber security, protect intellectual property and research, and ensure transparency in collaborations with foreign entities to protect Australian interests.

Concerns that information about pro-democracy students had been collected during protests will be investigated.

“One of the things that the taskforce will be doing will be looking at security on our university campuses, to make sure that students can go about their business freely, and be able to express their views freely,” Tehan said.

Hamilton says the findings from UQ’s investigations into July 24 will be “the acid test” for UQ and Hoj and need to be public.

UQ says any disciplinary action against students will be confidential.

Pavlou did not give evidence, saying his enrolment was threatened by university officials after discussions about subsequent protests.

Says Hamilton: “I’m interested in what the university does … to date their actions have undermined the notion of university autonomy and free speech.”

University vice-chancellors continue to meet with the Federal Government over its proposed new performance funding model.

Hoj says this model means that the maximum indexation a university can get is about 1.36 per cent per annum.

That’s if a university gets 100 per cent on measures such as student research, satisfaction and attrition rates.

“Noone would do that,” says Hoj. “So in reality, if we take the same amount of students as we do now, for the next many years we will be funded less and less per student and that pushes us towards maintaining a high international student intake.”

Hoj, Hamilton, Monk, Golley and Laurenceson all agree: Australian universities’ reliance on foreign students – particularly Chinese – is a conundrum rooted in the successive federal governments’ funding decisions.

In UQ’s lecture halls, Chinese students take their seats, keen to receive a world-class education for the big bucks they pay.

Australian students sit next to them, their places subsidised by their foreign counterparts. And in the food court of the St Lucia campus, a wall plastered with a rainbow of sticky notes symbolises the complex world that has brought them together.