Australia to use coronavirus suppression to push diplomatic weight

Australia is positioning to lead the push for a review into the world's response to the coronavirus outbreak as it looks to be one of the first countries to exit the global pandemic.

Although the Morrison government has not yet committed to easing restrictions and is intent on preventing a second wave of COVID-19, it is turning its attention to reforming the World Health Organisation and its relationship with China.

Foreign Affairs Minister Marise Payne has called for a review into the world's coronavirus response.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen

Foreign Minister Marise Payne this week called for the review, urging China to allow transparency in the process and saying the organisation should run the inquiry. China has accused the United States of running a campaign of "smear and stigmatisation" that has politically manipulated other countries against Beijing and the WHO. China's Foreign Ministry said on Monday Australia should not "blindly follow" calls for a global inquiry.

The Morrison government is now exploring the possibility of the United Nations appointing an independent investigator to review the world's response to the pandemic, which would probe China and the WHO's handling in the early days of the outbreak.

Liberal MP Dave Sharma, a former senior diplomat, said he supported the move by Senator Payne to call for an "independent and outside investigation" into the WHO's performance.

"I would expect the UN Secretary-General should take the lead in initiating such a process," Mr Sharma said.

Australia is only a middle power on the world stage but there is a growing acknowledgement within senior ranks of the Morrison government that it may have to take the lead in pushing for a review with many bigger countries including the United Kingdom and the United States still battling major outbreaks of the deadly pandemic.

Herve Lemahieu, director of the power and diplomacy program at the Lowy Institute, said Australia needed to lead the push for an independent review to make sure the crisis was not exploited by China.

"We are in a global race for who can recover fastest in terms of both the health epidemic and the economic crisis that has followed," he said.

"This is also a great opportunity for a middle power to demonstrate it can have heft in the international system and can use its advantages to the best possible effect – not just thinking about ourselves but the broader global ramifications."

Liberal MP Tim Wilson said the WHO needed to decouple from being "beholden to any individual interest to a community of nations and putting health first".

"Instead they seem captured by China and putting politics first," he said.

Labor's foreign affairs spokeswoman Penny Wong said Australia needed international cooperation in any reform of the WHO.

"We are not a superpower that can just throw our weight around," she said.

"That means we need to be very active in making multilateral institutions like the UN and the WHO work better."

China on Monday also accused Australia of "grossly interfering" in its internal affairs and "disregarding facts" after Senator Payne said the arrest of pro-democracy figures in Hong Kong amid the coronavirus pandemic undermined stability, trust and goodwill in the midst of a global crisis.

"Hong Kong is part of China, and Hong Kong affairs are China's internal affairs, which no foreign country has the right to interfere," the Chinese embassy in Canberra said in statement.