China praises Gillard Dalai Lama snub
The Sydney Morning Herald, 28 June 2012
Chinese state-controlled media has heaped praise on Prime Minister Julia Gillard for refusing to met Tibet’s Dalai Lama – singling out her break with the past practice of Australian leaders.
But a senior member of the People’s Daily – a mouthpiece newspaper for the ruling Communist party – warned an officially sponsored media workshop that Australia’s enhanced military ties to the US sent confusing signals to Chinese people.
Liu Huaxin, a committee member of international development at the People’s Daily, told the meeting Ms Gillard’s decision to snub the Dalai Lama has been “acclaimed” by China.
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He also took the rare step of displaying a photograph of the Tibetan religious leader – whose image is almost never seen in China – showing him alongside a separate picture of Ms Gillard with an illustrated speech bubble saying “No!”.
China has so far refused requests by Foreign Minister Bob Carr for Australian diplomats to visit Tibet to investigate human rights concerns.
The talks, the Australia China Media Forum, are being held in the southern province of Guangdong and include around 50 representatives of media from both countries and first took place in 2006.
The stated aim is to promote greater links with China’s burgeoning media sector, which like in Australia, is undergoing a transformation fuelled by technological change.
But Chinese retains heavy censorship and media representatives are considered unlikely to stray into controversial issues without official imprimatur.
Mr Liu said through a translator there was a view Australia was “tied up to the chariot of the US and it was easy to get on but more difficult to get off”.
He realed off a litany of complaints about Australia’s attitudes to China, pointing to the decision to base 2500 US marines near Darwin, recent speculation about a secret chapter on war with China in Australia’s 2009 military blueprint, banning Chinese company Huawei from investing in the National Broadband Network and plans for American surveilance drones take off from the Australian Indian ocean territory of Cocos Islands.
But he later clarified his remarks, saying he was reflecting general public perceptions, not official policy.
Former Australian ambassador to Beijing, Geoff Raby, told the forum he had no reason to doubt government denials of any secret China chapter in the 2009 Defence white paper.
He said he was “sanguine” about the US-China relationship and thought conflict was unlikely.
But he wanted Australia to do much more to acknowledge the importace of China and the media relationship was underdown, with no commercial TV corespondents from Australia based in China.
The talks also included discussion of promoting business ties and the role of social media in both countries.
Australia’s present ambassador to China, Frances Adamson, said it was important not to fall back on stereotypes when reporting both countries.
China’s State Council Information Office sponsored Daniel Flitton’s travel to Guangdong.