Australia is back in China’s good books, and Beijing wants the world to know it.
Anthony Albanese is being held up by Xi Jinping as a model Western leader, playing a bit part in China’s global effort to be seen as a reasonable alternative to Donald Trump.
The country’s state-run newspapers carried front-page pictures on Wednesday of a beaming Albanese meeting President Xi in the Great Hall of the People, and stories extolling the “turnaround” in bilateral relations.
According to the China Daily, Xi told Albanese the improvement in relations proved “adhering to the principles of treating each other as equals, seeking common ground while shelving differences, and engaging in mutually beneficial co-operation” would serve the interests of both countries and their people.
The subtext? “Australia shows us respect, unlike the US. If countries want to get along with China and reap the economic rewards, behave like Albanese.”
The tabloid Global Times said the Australia-China relationship was poised to soar into the “stratosphere”.
But its take wasn’t all positive, sounding a note of warning in its lead editorial over Albanese’s pledge to strip Chinese-owned company Landbridge of its lease over the strategically located Port of Darwin.
“At present, there are specific issues between China and Australia that need to be discussed, such as the lease of Darwin Port and the expansion of the China-Australia Free Trade Agreement,” it said.
“There are also practical obstacles, especially the tendencies towards ‘pan-politicisation’ and ‘pan-securitisation’, as well as interference from third parties.”
China’s No.2, Premier Li Qiang, also fired a shot across the bow in a speech to Australian and Chinese business leaders on Wednesday night, warning Beijing expected a non-discriminatory business environment for its companies.
“I trust that Australia will also treat Chinese enterprises fairly and also properly resolve issues in terms of market access and investment review,” he said.
Li laid out the rewards on offer if Australia toed the line, saying the Chinese could consume more “lobsters, wine and tuna” than the country’s exporters could sell.
“About 80 per cent of the trade surpluses of Australia come from its trade with China,” he said. “Such trade has surged in recent years, and this has proved that continued sound development of China-Australia trade co-operation can best serve the common interests of both countries.”
For his part, Albanese is glossing over the irritants in the relationship, hailing the trip as a success, and proof of his “patient and calibrated approach” to stabilising bilateral ties.
And to those who question the wisdom of getting too close to the communist dictatorship that held Australia’s economy to ransom just a few years ago and is turning out warships and submarines at a rate of knots?
“Dialogue builds understanding,” Albanese said, restating his guiding foreign policy principle that is at once blindingly obvious while completely obscuring the complexity of the relationship.
As is always the case with Chinese diplomacy, there were outcomes to report.
In the official leader-level talks with Li on Tuesday, the PM agreed to a review of the countries’ 2014 free trade deal.
This is formality, activating an inbuilt mechanism in the deal a decade after it was signed. But for Beijing, in the current circumstances, it’s a clear win, opening the way for it to raise a range of curly issues in upcoming consultations.
In a more minor success for the Chinese side, Australia agreed to allow the import of Chinese jujubes, also known as red dates. The sweet, slightly tangy fruit is apparently packed with vitamin C, potassium and anti-oxidants – a further symbol in Beijing’s telling of Australia’s appetite for all things China.
Albanese and Li also declared apples from mainland Australia would now be allowed into China under new biosecurity protocols, reannouncing an agreement revealed several months ago.
Meanwhile, on page three of the China Daily, there was a photo of Xi extending a hand to Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, whom he met before he sat down with Albanese on Tuesday.
The accompanying story says the pair discussed how to “promote a more just and equitable order”.
Behold, the two faces of China.
More Coverage
China cannot change who we are
The Prime Minister must devote more time and effort to the US relationship. Regardless of Australia’s current warmer relationship with China, the latter’s strategic ambitions in Asia are fundamentally different from Australia’s view.
Anti-Semitism v Islamophobia? No comparison
According to available evidence, there have been no firebombing attacks on Sunni or Shia Muslim mosques in Sydney or Melbourne and no angry disruptions of Australian Muslim restaurants.