On April 21, the Australian government announced the cancellation of Victoria’s Belt and Road agreement with China, a decision that drew the ire of Beijing, especially since Australia was the first country to cancel its Belt and Road agreement with China.
Since the launch of the “Belt and Road” strategy, led by Chinese President Xi Jinping, China’s new version of the Silk Road has been extending across continents and oceans to the world, yet the European Union only realized two years ago that China’s Silk Road embodies a sense of hegemony and finally established that its relationship with China is cooperative. However, the relationship of “institutional competition” has been a series of problems in Asia, Europe and Africa over the past two years, but Australia has simply “torn up” the two agreements signed earlier between Victoria and China. However, Australia has simply “ripped up” two important agreements signed between Victoria and China on the Belt and Road. Beijing’s anger is palpable.
A report in France’s Le Monde on Friday asked: Which sector of Australia’s economy should now be hit by Beijing’s lightning? After barley, beef and wine, what products will be blocked from China’s doorstep?
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said Thursday that Australia’s approach is a serious damage to China-Australia relations and to mutual trust between the two countries. China demands that Australia immediately correct its mistake. Otherwise, China will take tough measures to counterattack.
Analysts point out that China-Australia relations have come to this point, and still talk about mutual trust? Beijing’s spokesman should take a moment to look back in history to see how relations between the two countries have deteriorated to such an extent.
There are signs that in August 2018, Australia ruled out Huawei from investing in Australia’s 5G construction, and in April 2020, Australia called for an international independent investigation into the New Crown virus, which, in Australia’s view, as a sovereign country, has the right to choose who builds 5G, taking into account national security; and in the context of the world’s descent into the New Crown pandemic, it is not surprising to call for an international investigation, but All this has provoked Beijing’s ire. The ‘Global Times’ warned on Thursday that China-Australia relations are likely to slide into an even darker bottomless abyss in the future.
China might want to think about what sanctions they have previously imposed on Australia. What has led to a dark abyss in bilateral relations? Even in this context, when Beijing foresaw that Australia was going to cancel the Belt and Road agreement, it published an article in the media through the Chinese ambassador to Australia last November, which it called “Australia’s 14 sins”, accusing Australia of poisoning the bilateral relationship and accusing the Australian parliamentary resolution of trying to undermine Victoria’s participation in the Belt and Road agreement. One Road agreement.
But in Canberra’s eyes, the framework agreement, signed in October 2019, is a way for China to use Victoria as a springboard to exert influence on Australia’s neighbors at the financial and geopolitical levels.
Australian experts say that through the Belt and Road, China seeks to create a global economy that revolves around it, a global economic circle in which China will be less dependent on others and others will be more dependent on China. To achieve this goal and to weaken the opposition, China hopes to win by division. In the face of Australia, if China cannot keep it away from the United States, it can try to create divisions within Australia.
Here is the example of New Zealand. The country chose a different perspective than neighboring Australia, and on Monday its foreign minister voiced opposition to the expansion of the Five Eyes Alliance. In January, New Zealand’s commerce minister inspired Australia to be “a little more diplomatic” if it wanted to improve Australia-China relations. Australia, for its part, fears that its neighbors will eventually fall for it.
Canberra’s policy is clear: it will not give in to China’s “national interest”, and all political parties are now united in this position. Of course, there is debate, and some argue that Australia needs to “add fuel to the fire” at a time when bilateral relations are so tense.
Australia is now the first country in the world to announce the cancellation of the Belt and Road agreement. The U.S. issued a statement of solidarity with Australia on April 23, with State Department spokesman Price saying that Australia has suffered great losses because of Beijing’s “coercive diplomacy,” but that “the United States continues to stand with the Australian people as they bear the brunt of China’s coercive behavior. ”
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