Foreign Minister Wong says engaging with the CCP never meant there would be no problems.
Foreign Minister Penny Wong has defended the Australian response to the incursion of Peoples Liberation Army-Navy (PLA-N) warships into Australia’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ) at a Senate inquiry on Feb. 27.
Wong said Labor was taking a “calm and consistent, not reckless and arrogant” approach to the issue, as it becomes apparent that the flotilla of three Chinese Community Party (CCP) warships is circumnavigating the continent.
The Australian Defence Force says the ships are now in the southern Great Australian Bight, after traversing the east coast of the continent and conducting live fire exercises in the Tasman Sea.
Under questioning from opposition Home Affairs spokesman, James Paterson, Wong said that while the current government focused on stabilising the relationship between the two countries, it “never meant there would be no problems.”
“It has always meant we should be able to engage directly with China to manage inevitable differences and problems without these problems derailing our ability to talk to each other.”
Wong said she had engaged with Bejiing’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi on the sidelines of the G20 foreign ministers’ meeting in Johannesburg, South Africa over the weekend and had “made clear … that the lack of notice for PLA-N’s activities did not meet our expectations and was of deep concern.
Wong also pushed back against Paterson saying the Coalition was pursuing the matter for political gain, saying Opposition Leader Peter Dutton only sought a briefing from the government four days after the incident.
“If this is such a big issue for you, surely you would have been pretty quick to request a briefing from the government, but you weren’t.”
Wong Takes Aim at Coalition
Wong then said the former Coalition government left “a massive vacuum in the Pacific.”
“China is going to keep being China, just as Mr. Dutton isn’t going to stop being Mr. Dutton, the man who once said it was inconceivable we wouldn’t go to war, is going to keep beating the drums of war,” she said, referring to Opposition Leader Peter Dutton.
“I don’t think it’s reasonable for the Leader of the Opposition to tell people in Menzies and Bennelong he is ‘pro-China’ … and then engage in that sort of rhetoric in Canberra,” Wong said
“The same people who had no regard for the consequences for Australian exporters or for Chinese Australian communities are at it again, trying to turn China into an election issue,” she said.
In response to calls for an international investigation into the origins of COVID-19 in 2020, Beijing imposed sanctions on $20 billion worth of Australian goods.
It also cut off diplomatic relations to the Morrison government, which had implemented a series of national security measures, like banning Huawei from 5G and blocking Chinese investment in critical minerals.
However, due to their efforts and the popularity of Chinese-owned social media app WeChat, local Chinese-Australian voters were influenced by CCP rhetoric that branded Morrison as “anti-Chinese.”
This had an impact on the Liberal Party’s vote at the 2022 election with an internal review finding the parts of the Chinese diaspora swung away from the party.
Opposition Turning Up the Pressure
The opposition has pressed the government on official statements it made about the live fire exercise that appeared to differ from the Department of Defence.
On Feb. 26, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese had said civilian and military organisations learned about the incident “at around the same time.”
Yet Defence Force chief David Johnston revealed the ADF first received notice from Airservices Australia and about one hour later heard from the New Zealand military.
“The Prime Minister is either making this up, shooting from the hip, or completely out of his depth—or maybe all three,” Dutton told 2GB radio.
“But what we do know is that he is at odds with the Chief of the Defence Force, and he needs to explain why, on such a totemic issue, he either wasn’t briefed, that he’s made up the facts, that he’s got it wrong. I mean, what could possibly be the logic or the rationale here?”
Doubts Whether Shots Were Fired
Meanwhile, there’s doubt over whether a shot was ever fired during the “live-fire” exercise.
Defence Minister Richard Marles told the ABC that the government was still not sure whether the exercise actually happened on Feb. 21 or whether the warships had announced they intended to do so.
A New Zealand frigate monitoring the flotilla reported that it observed behaviour “consistent with a live-fire activity,” which was the warships deploying and recovering a floating target.
Still, neither Australia’s nor New Zealand’s military has been able to confirm whether shots were actually fired.
New Zealand Foreign Minister Winston Peters, meanwhile, believes his meeting with Wang has led to CCP to consider whether appropriate notice was given.
“I think it would be true to say that he took our concerns on board,” Peters said after meeting and dinner in the Chinese capital.
He said he framed the issue in the context of the two countries’ close ties since signing a cooperation agreement in 2008. China is the biggest importer of products and services from both New Zealand and Australia.
“We’re in the second decade of this arrangement, and this is a failure in it at this time, and we’d like to have it corrected in the future,” he said.
“That is something which we believe is under consideration.”