Labor leader Anthony Albanese lashes China plot claims

Anthony Albanese has lashed the PM as “desperate” for trying to weaponise classified ASIO reports to suggest China is trying to infiltrate the ALP.

Labor leader Anthony Albanese has lashed the Prime Minister as “desperate” for trying to weaponise highly classified ASIO reports to suggest China is trying to infiltrate the ALP.

Mr Albanese tried to shut down speculation that the target of the foreign inference plot was NSW Labor insisting that ASIO had reassured him it had “no issue” with any of its candidates.

However, he did not deny that ASIO had briefed him on a secret plot that it had disrupted before candidates even knew what was happening.

The Labor leader accused the Prime Minister of trashing the bipartisan tradition in matters of national security for political purposes to win the next election.

“I say to them, that national security is too important to engage in, in game playing, such as what we saw on the floor of the parliament,’’ Mr Albanese said.

“However much the government needs a distraction.”

Anthony Albanese has slammed the Morrison government. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Gary Ramage

Mr Albanese revealed he had spoken to ASIO boss Mike Burgess on Friday and asked permission to confirm ASIO had no issues with any Labor candidates.

“I asked him if I could indicate that I’ve spoken to Mr Burgess today and he has reaffirmed that he has not raised concern at any of my candidates. I can’t be clearer than that,” he said.

ASIO revealed this week it had stopped the plot before any of the political candidates even knew what was happening.

Mr Burgess also briefed the Prime Minister and the Labor leader about the foreign interference plot this week, before releasing details in a speech.

The next day, there were explosive claims raised in Parliament.

ASIO has declined to say which party was involved or which country.

Despite reports that the target was NSW Labor and the puppeteer was a wealthy Chinese businessman with links to the Communist party, ASIO is refusing to provide further details.

However, Liberal sources rejected an ABC report that the country involved was Russia.

Asked to clarify the claims on Thursday night, an ASIO spokesperson told news.com.au that the spy agency was simply referring journalists to Mr Burgess’ speech.

Earlier, Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton doubled down on his claim that Mr Albanese was China’s candidate.

“I think you’ve got to stick to the facts,’’ he said.

“You look at the facts, in this case, I think certainly, from what I see, both open source and other intelligence that I see it’s a statement of the obvious.”

Mr Albanese labelled the government “desperate”. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Gary Ramage

In other words, Mr Dutton is claiming that not only “open source” and public information supports his claim that China would prefer Mr Albanese as Prime Minister but also highly classified material that he sees in his role as Defence Minister.

Mr Dutton also sits on the national security committee of cabinet that is regularly briefed by ASIO.

“And there were relationships going back to Sam Dastyari and Bob Carr is obviously is very close still to Beijing, and there are many others that are alive,’’ he said

“On what’s openly available to us, and when I say otherwise, there’s no doubt in my mind about the statement that I made yesterday. And I think there needs to be a greater awareness, frankly, particularly from the Labor Party about the engagement of people who, who don’t have our national interests.

“At its heart, that’s the reality of the situation. We’re dealing with a very different China, the Chinese government or the Communist party now than they were five or 10 years ago.

“I think there’s open-source information reported over a long period of time, both in terms, quite frankly, of China and Russia exerting political influence, not just here.”