Anthony Albanese being a ‘good boy’ for China, defence expert Peter Jennings says

Beijing expects the PM to continue to follow its demands that Australia softens its language towards China, but still wants the government to go further, a former official in the senior ranks of the defence department says.

Chinese ambassador to Australia Xiao Qian. Picture: Martin Ollman

A former official in the senior ranks of the defence department says China expects Anthony Albanese to continue being “a good boy” and follow Beijing’s demands on Australia to soften its language towards China, in the wake of comments from the ambassador to Australia calling on Canberra to clarify “misunderstandings” on Taiwan and respect Beijing’s territorial claims in the South China Sea.

Peter Jennings said Chinese ambassador Xiao Qian’s language was “less insulting” than what had been said by officials in the past, but the message to Australia remained the same.

“That message is ‘do what we want’, basically,” Mr Jennings, now the Strategic Analysis Australia director, said.

He said the resumption of the lobster trade earlier this month was clearly “a reward” for Australia’s approach to China under the Labor government, but that Beijing still wanted the government to go further.

“Albanese is being rewarded for being a good boy,” he said.

“He’s mostly done what he’s been told. He’s shut criticism down. He doesn’t react when they do bad things in the South China Sea.”

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese. Picture: NewsWire/ Gaye Gerard

Mr Xiao also criticised commentary by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, which is set to receive significant government oversight in coming months after a review into its operations, because of the negative view it portrayed of China.

The intervention by the Chinese ambassador ahead of the federal election – due by May next year – comes as Beijing announced sanctions on a number of defence firms, including one from Australia.

According to the foreign affairs ministry, Beijing will sanction organisations such as Raytheon Australia because they or their parent companies are selling arms to Taiwan.

The sanctions will include a freezing of any assets in China owned by executives of the targeted companies, while trade and collaboration between Chinese organisations or individuals with the Australian and US firms will be banned.

A Foreign Affairs and Trade Department spokeswoman said Australia’s approach to China would always be “to co-operate where we can, disagree where we must and engage in our national interest”.

“As the Foreign Minister has said, by navigating our differences wisely and engaging in dialogue we can grow our relation­ship and uphold our respective national interests,” she said.

“Australia shares our region’s concerns about China’s destabilising actions in the South China Sea, including dangerous actions by Chinese vessels towards the Philippines, and its excessive maritime claims which are inconsistent with international law, including the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea.”

The DFAT spokeswoman said the Prime Minister and Foreign Minister had frequently raised these concerns with their Chinese counterparts.

“There has been no change to our one-China policy,” she said.

Mr Jennings said that regardless of any tangible policy changes, the optics of seeming more amenable to China would have consequences for Labor.

“It’s just an example of our government’s tin ear that they don’t seem to realise that being seen to be too deferential for China is bad politics,” he said.