China suspends China-Australia Strategic Economic Dialogue indefinitely
Beijing has cut off all diplomatic contact with the Australian government under the dialogue.
Singapore: Beijing has cut off all diplomatic contact with the Australian government under the China-Australia Strategic Economic Dialogue, a key channel of communication between the two countries.
The move, announced by China’s National Development and Reform Commission on Thursday morning, will make the task of repairing already strained diplomatic relations even more difficult as it will block contact between key government officials below the ministerial level under the dialogue.
The decision is the first major Chinese government response to the Morrison government’s cancellation of Victoria’s Belt and Road agreement in April.
The dialogue was established in 2014 in Beijing as a forum for the Australian treasurer, trade minister and the chairman of China’s National Development and Reform Commission to discuss trade deals.
The Australian dollar fell quickly on the news, dropping 0.4 per cent to US77.16¢ after earlier trading at US77.58¢.
In a rare public proclamation published on the government website, the commission said Australian government officials had launched a series of measures to disrupt normal exchanges and cooperation between China and Australia “out of a Cold War mindset and ideological discrimination”.
“Based on the current attitude of the Australian Commonwealth Government toward China-Australia cooperation, the National Development and Reform Commission of the People’s Republic of China decides to indefinitely suspend all activities under the framework of the China-Australia Strategic Economic Dialogue,” it said in the statement.
As treasurer, Prime Minister Scott Morrison was one of the last minister’s to travel to Beijing under the dialogue in 2017. He met with large Chinese investors and Chairman He Lifeng of China’s National Development and Reform Commission to discuss “opportunities for Australian and Chinese businesses to cooperate.”
The relationship has deteriorated sharply since then, driven initially by Australia’s decision to ban Huawei from the 5G network in 2018 and introduce foreign interference laws, and furthered last year over disputes concerning the origin of the coronavirus pandemic, human rights and national security.
Morrison on Thursday said he wanted China and Australia and the whole region to work together.
“The best way to do that is to ensure the rule of law and how we operate, that we respect trade laws, that we keep the South China Sea free and open for transit,” he told 3AW radio before the Chinese announcement.
“Whoever is in favour of that, we’re working well together with them.”
The indefinite suspension of the high-level dialogue will hamper efforts at the sub-ministerial level to negotiate $20 billion in trade strikes on half a dozen key industries by Beijing. Those negotiations have already been thwarted by China’s ministers refusing to take phone calls from the counterparts and increasingly frosty relations between the foreign diplomatic missions and the Australian and Chinese governments.
“In terms of diplomatic signalling, this is definitely retribution for the events of the past few weeks,” said trade expert Jeffrey Wilson from the Perth USAsia Centre.
“They were looking for something to make a point, and have run out of exports to sanction, so have suspended this.
“Basically, it shows China has run out of ammunition. By going ‘thermonuclear’ on trade in 2020, they now have no substantive ways to punish Australia anymore, and have to scrap around for impact-free acts of pure symbolism.”
Interesting development. What next now? Ideas? Thoughts?
