Beijing tells Canberra to take ‘concrete actions’ before Penny Wong meets Chinese Foreign Minister
Beijing has told Canberra to take ‘concrete actions’ if it wants to improve the fraught bilateral relationship.
Beijing has told the Albanese government to take “concrete actions” if it wants to improve the fraught bilateral relationship ahead of the first meeting of Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong and her Chinese counterpart in Bali on Thursday.
Speaking days before their first encounter, a Chinese foreign ministry spokesman said Canberra needed to work with Beijing in a “rational and positive light” and urged the new government to put “differences aside”.
“There is no ‘autopilot’ mode in improving China-Australia relations. A reset requires concrete actions,” said Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian.
“This meets the aspirations of people in both countries and the trend of our times,” Mr Zhao said at a Beijing press conference on Tuesday evening.
The comments repeat the same formulation China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi used during the Papua New Guinea leg of the unprecedented Pacific blitz Xi Jinping’s envoy launched in the first days of the new Australian government.
Beijing’s posturing comes as close friends and partners of detained Australians Cheng Lei and Dr Yang Hengjun say their plight must be “top of the agenda” of any meeting between the two foreign ministers.
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang will meet Senator Wong for the first time during the two-day G20 foreign ministers’ forum in Bali, which starts on Thursday. An expected one-on-one meeting has not yet been arranged following Beijing’s recent re-buff of Trade Minister Don Farrell at a WTO meeting in Geneva.
Days ahead of the Bali meeting, Chinese officials have ended the more than two-month cessation of regular visits by lawyers and consular officials to the Chinese-born Australian citizens.
The pair remain in Beijing prison cells, awaiting news of their sentences after their respective closed-door, one-day trials.
UTS associate professor Feng Chongyi, a close friend of Dr Yang, said the two imprisoned Australians needed to be at the “top of the agenda” of any meeting between the Chinese and Australian foreign ministers.
“Australians have been subject to arbitrary detention and tortured. If we want to improve the relationship in any way this needs to be dealt with properly,” Professor Feng told The Australian.
Nick Coyle, Ms Cheng’s partner and the outgoing head of the business lobby AustCham China, said an end to the pair’s limbo in Beijing’s penal system would help improve China-Australia relations.
“These sorts of issues can be discussed and can be resolved, you would hope, relatively quickly and compassionately,” Mr Coyle told the ABC.
The Albanese government has continued the Morrison government’s advocacy work for the two Australians, who have been imprisoned during the deterioration of the bilateral relationship.
A fortnight ago, Foreign Minister Wong publicly noted Ms Cheng’s 47th birthday, her second behind bars.
“Our hearts go out to her children, whose birthday messages will be passed on during a consular visit to her next Wednesday,” Senator Wong said, confirming the resumption of consular access.
The positive signals from Beijing remain modest.
China’s ambassador in Australia, Xiao Qian, recently said Australians should “respect the independent … legal process of China”.
He said the “basic rights” of Ms Cheng and Dr Yang had been guaranteed, “according to our own laws”.
While Australian diplomats were able to read a note from her two children to Ms Cheng, the former Chinese state news anchor has not been allowed to talk to them since being detained and imprisoned almost 700 days ago.
Meanwhile, Dr Yang, a writer known in China as “democracy peddler”, has been in a cell for more than 1200 days.
Senator Wong released a statement on May 27, five days after being sworn in as Foreign Minister, to mark the one-year anniversary of Dr Yang’s one-day, closed trial on espionage charges he has denied.
She repeated the Australian government’s concern about the delay, his total lack of access to his family and his limited access to legal representation.
Professor Feng thanked the new Foreign Minister for continuing her predecessor Marise Payne’s advocacy.
“I’m grateful for her action to keep pressure on the Chinese government and for standing for the protection of human rights,” he said.
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Our thoughts are with Cheng Lei - especially today on her birthday.
— Senator Penny Wong (@SenatorWong) June 25, 2022
Our hearts go out to her children, whose birthday messages will be passed on during a consular visit to her next Wednesday.
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