Gladys Liu linked to developer who campaigned for China’s Belt and Road initiative
Liberal MP Gladys Liu has been linked to a property developer described as the “implementer” of the Australasia Belt and Road Advocacy intiative, a group formed to champion the controversial plan.
National
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A close friend of Liberal MP Gladys Liu last year set up a group to campaign for China’s controversial Belt and Road Initiative within Australia and the Pacific.
Prominent property developer Chen Guo Jing has been described on Chinese language sites as the “implementer” of the Australasia Belt and Road Advocacy initiative.
The revelations come after Ms Liu held a party for her volunteers in a building owned by Mr Chen’s CBD Development Group, which included a sign championing the pro-Belt and Road organisation.
Australia has been upping its infrastructure spending in the Pacific in part to give countries an alternative to the Belt and Road Initiative, President Xi Jinping’s signature program to bankroll hundreds of billions of dollars of infrastructure around the world.
A conference was held in March last year to celebrate the founding of the Australian-based group.
According to one Chinese website, Mr Chen told the conference the Belt and Road Initiative carried “the Chinese dream of realising national rejuvenation” and it was “incumbent upon us to lead strategic co-operation at home and abroad”.
Ms Liu distanced herself from any connection to the initiative, aimed at expanding China’s political power.
“As we’ve said before as a government, Australia supports regional investment initiatives that are transparent and open, uphold robust standards, meet genuine need and avoid unsustainable debt burdens for recipient countries,” Ms Liu told the Herald Sun.
“In 2018, I was not the preselected candidate for Chisholm. I did not attend the event that you are referring to.”
Mr Chen has donated more than $50,000 to the Labor Party and once appeared beside Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews on a government trip to China.
Ms Liu described Mr Chen as one of her “good friends” in her maiden speech to parliament in July.
The Hong Kong-born MP also thanked Asian Business Association of Whitehorse president Tom Zheng in the same speech.
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Mr Zheng, a prominent figure in the Box Hill community, appears to have been listed last year as an Australian member of the Communist Party’s All-China Federation of Returned Overseas.
He has also appeared at events to raise the Chinese flag at Box Hill police station.
Mr Andrews broke ranks with the federal government last year when he signed a memorandum of understanding with Beijing on Belt and Road, which is viewed in Canberra as a vehicle for Chinese regional and global expansion.
Originally published as Gladys Liu linked to developer who campaigned for China’s Belt and Road initiative