«Данное сообщение (материал) создано и (или) распространено иностранным средством массовой информации, выполняющим функции иностранного агента, и (или) российским юридическим лицом, выполняющим функции иностранного агента»

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The superpower is seeking to ease tensions with at least some of America’s allies

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“My government is pro-panda,” said Australia’s prime minister, Anthony Albanese, as he prepared to host the highest-ranking Chinese visitor to his country in seven years. Mr Albanese was simply referring to the bears that China has lent to Australia’s Adelaide Zoo. Still, such sound-bites had long been rare before he was elected in 2022. Relations between China and Australia had suffered years of acrimony. The mood is now much changed. During his four-day trip to Australia, beginning on June 15th, China’s prime minister, Li Qiang, will be keen to show that even with one of America’s closest allies, cordial ties are possible.

In China’s political hierarchy, Mr Li is a distant number two to the president, Xi Jinping, who last visited Australia a decade ago. But his trip has much symbolic importance. Under Australia’s previous governments, China hawks held sway. Relations turned particularly sour in 2017 when the prime minister at the time, Malcolm Turnbull, tried to clamp down on Chinese attempts to exert covert influence in Australia. He introduced laws aimed at curbing this. In 2018 he also took the lead among Western powers by banning Chinese involvement in the building of advanced 5G communications networks. His successor, Scott Morrison, infuriated China by calling for an international investigation into the origins of covid-19. China responded with sweeping restrictions on Australian exports to China. Mr Li’s visit is a clear sign that both countries want to move on.

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The mood-change was already clear when Australia’s leader met Mr Xi in Beijing in November. “The China-Australia relationship has embarked on the right path,” Mr Xi told Mr Albanese. In the preceding months China had eased its sanctions on Australian barley, coal, cotton, copper and timber. Mr Albanese’s milder tone may have helped. But Australian officials believe China may have sensed that its sanctions were failing. Australia had suffered little pain and had drawn even closer to America. Mr Albanese’s election gave Mr Xi an excuse to change course.

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In China’s view, pandas are a perfect way to say you want to be pals. Mr Li will begin his trip with a visit to the Adelaide Zoo. Its two pandas have spent 15 years in Australia and are due to be sent back to China at the end of the year. Mr Li is likely to announce that they will either stay or be replaced. That would please Mr Albanese.

But Australia’s leader is no panda-hugger in the sense of wanting warm and fuzzy ties with China regardless of how it behaves. He has shown no sign of retreat from Australia’s commitment to AUKUS, a defence pact reached between Australia, America and Britain in 2021, when Mr Morrison was prime minister. Nor has he wavered in support for the Quad, an informal security-related group made up of Australia, America, India and Japan that drew closer in the years leading up to Mr Albanese becoming prime minister. (China—with good reason—sees both of these networks as efforts to toughen resistance to its power.) Shortly before visiting Beijing, Mr Albanese went to America, where he called Australia’s relationship with that country “second to none” and “a relationship of trust”. He was evasive when asked in Beijing whether he trusted Mr Xi.

Australian officials see China’s change of heart as part of a broader shift. This has involved the tempering of its aggressive “wolf-warrior” diplomacy and re-engagement with America and its allies. After meeting Mr Albanese, Mr Xi went to San Francisco, where he met President Joe Biden for the first time in a year. In May Mr Li held trilateral talks with the leaders of Japan and South Korea for the first time since 2019. “It was pointless to keep flogging Australia,” says Richard McGregor of the Lowy Institute, a think-tank in Sydney. “All they got out of it was AUKUS and a strengthened Quad. And that is not the winning hand that China had hoped for.”

Shortly before his visit to China last year, Mr Albanese said he would not end a controversial 99-year lease of the strategic port of Darwin by a private Chinese company, Landbridge. But Mr Albanese is trying to reduce China-related risks to Australia’s economy. China is the country’s biggest trading partner (and the biggest buyer of its iron ore—which, being badly needed in China, remained sanction-free). His government plans to spend billions of dollars on subsidies for Australian firms to help them challenge China’s dominance of minerals and technologies needed by Australia’s green industries. It is boosting scrutiny of foreign investments, too. On June 2nd Australia ordered Chinese-linked funds to divest their holdings in Northern Minerals, a rare-earths miner.

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Hey there, partner?

Mr Li may try to nudge Mr Albanese to back China’s bid to join the Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership, a trade pact. An inducement, he may be hoping, will be China’s lifting of its last remaining restrictions on Australian imports: wine started flowing freely in March, beef curbs were further eased in May and lobsters may soon crawl behind. But Mr Li is unlikely to make much headway. Australia strongly opposes China’s accession.

Chart: The Economist

Like his predecessors, Mr Albanese worries about China’s aggressive behaviour in the region. Last month Australia accused a Chinese air-force jet of dropping flares near an Australian military helicopter in the Yellow Sea. Mr Albanese called this “unacceptable” and said he would raise the matter with Mr Li.

China’s prime minister may hope that even if he cannot prise Australia away from America, he can at least try to win over some Australians whose views matter. He is expected to meet members of the country’s 1.4m-strong ethnic-Chinese community, which makes up about 5.5% of the population. Opposition within this group to Mr Morrison’s strident views on China contributed to his defeat by Mr Albanese.

But even with the help of pandas, Mr Li will have a hard job finding admirers. Recent polling by the Lowy Institute suggests the public is nervous of China. In 2020 55% of Australians saw China primarily as an economic partner rather than as a security threat. The worriers have since become a majority: 53% now view China mainly as a threat (though that is down from 63% in 2021 and 2022). In the 2010s between 39% and 48% of respondents to the institute’s annual polls said they thought China would threaten Australia militarily in the coming 20 years. Now more than 70% do.

Mr Li will find a similar hardening of views in New Zealand, where he was starting his trip as The Economist went to press (after Australia he will visit Malaysia). Though a friend of America, New Zealand has long pursued close ties with China, its largest overseas buyer of the dairy and other farm products that are the staple of its exports. New Zealand is now eyeing the possibility of joining AUKUS collaboration on technologies such as artificial intelligence, quantum computing and hypersonic missiles. Last month its foreign minister, Winston Peters, said the country was “seriously concerned” about China’s security-related activity in the Pacific.

At best, perhaps, Mr Li can expect that America’s friends will keep their criticism of China’s human-rights record muted. Mr Albanese’s mantra is “co-operate where we can, disagree where we must”, which means rarely criticising China publicly, and raising concerns behind closed doors. He has not joined America and the European Union in imposing sanctions on Chinese officials for human-rights abuses. But Mr Albanese has said he will raise the case of Yang Hengjun, a China-born Australian who was given a suspended death sentence in February by a Chinese court for espionage. No matter what tone of voice Mr Albanese uses, China is unlikely to pay attention. Its efforts to charm are increasingly impeded by its fixation on perceived threats at home. ■

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This article appeared in the China section of the print edition under the headline “From wolf warrior to panda-pusher”

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China

June 15th 2024

• →Li Qiang and China look to make up with Australia
• →Foreign judges are fed up with Hong Kong’s political environment
• →China is going crazy for durians
• →Why China takes young Tibetans from their families

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From the June 15th 2024 edition

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Panama symbolises the Sino-American struggle for influence

The superpowers use soft and hard power

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Tensions with the West are fuelling China’s anxiety about food supplies

Grain pains are growing

Hail China’s new “ice-and-snow economy”

The country is betting on winter sports and tourism to boost growth in its rustbelt

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Источник: www.economist.com