Chinese interference in Australia’s Parliament??

As far as instances of foreign interference go, this one was as blatant as it gets.

China funded Australian Senators to travel to China, where they hatched a plan with China to get a motion through the Australian Senate supporting China, and back in Australia the Senators last week successfully moved and passed a motion in the Senate supporting China’s position on the international stage against established Australian policy.

Given the official concerns over recent years about foreign interference, this example is stunning.

So, what is going to be done about it?

Nothing, because the “China” in question is the Republic of China (ROC), a.k.a. Taiwan, not the People’s Republic of China (PRC) run from Beijing—nothing will be done, nothing will be said in the media, and it won’t even be considered foreign interference.

Yet Taiwan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs paid for the flights and accommodation of Labor Senator Deb O’Neill and Liberal Senator David Fawcett to attend the annual summit of the hawkish anti-PRC Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China (IPAC), held in Taipei on 28-30 July, along with pairs of legislators from 24 other countries.

There, they resolved to return to their respective countries and pass motions in their Parliaments which are against the United Nations resolution that admitted the People’s Republic of China to the UN in 1971 in place of Taiwan’s dictator Chiang Kai Shek’s Republic of China.

Salami-slicing sovereignty

The motion that passed Australia’s Senate last week stated:

That, in the opinion of the Senate, the following is a matter of urgency:

That United Nations Resolution 2758 of 25th October 1971 does not establish the People’s Republic of China’s sovereignty over Taiwan and does not determine the future status of Taiwan in the United Nations, nor Taiwanese participation in UN agencies or international organisations.

Compare the Senate motion with the actual text of UN Resolution 2758 (XXVI) from 1971:

THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY.

Recalling the principles of the Charter of the United Nations.

Considering the restoration of the lawful rights of the People’s Republic of China is essential both for the protection of the Charter of the United Nations and for the cause that the United Nations must serve under the Charter.

Recognizing that the representatives of the Government of the People’s Republic of China are the only lawful representatives of China to the United Nations and that the People’s Republic of China is one of the five permanent members of the Security Council.

Decides to restore all its rights to the People’s Republic of China and to recognize the representatives of its Government as the only legitimate representatives of China to the United Nations, and to expel forthwith the representatives of Chiang Kai-shek from the place which they unlawfully occupy at the United Nations and in all the organizations related to it. (Emphasis added.)

The assertion in the Senate motion is factually correct, but mischievous in implying that this was the purpose of the UN Resolution. The actual purpose of the UN resolution was to accept the reality that Taiwan had been legally restored to China’s sovereign territory by Japan’s instrument of surrender in 1945 (before the advent of the People’s Republic of China) and that the PRC had subsequently become the legitimate government of the whole of China.

However, the motion by the IPAC Senators is a salami-slicing tactic, to introduce the possibility of Taiwan being represented at the UN in the future as an independent country, which Taiwan is not.

This goes against Australia’s One China policy, expressed clearly in the 21 December 1972 Joint Communiqué of the governments of the Commonwealth of Australia and the People’s Republic of China, which states:

“The Australian Government recognises the Government of the People’s Republic of China as the sole legal Government of China, acknowledges the position of the Chinese Government that Taiwan is a province of the People’s Republic of China, and has decided to remove its official representation from Taiwan before 25 January 1973.”

Questions for the Australian government

In 2013, Australia honoured former Singaporean Foreign Minister George Yeo with an honorary Officer of the Order of Australia for helping further Australia’s relationship with the region. Yeo is a leading expert on China, so it would be wise to heed this friend’s advice. In a 19 June 2021 podcast, Yeo emphasised to Singapore’s former Ambassador to the UN Kishore Mahbubani that China’s decision to establish relations with the USA and Australia etc. was based entirely on our countries accepting there was one China. “So that is bedrock”, Yeo said. “It is not a card. If you play the bedrock as if it is a card, then the structure upon which an edifice is built can rapidly collapse. … So from China’s perspective, there must be no ambiguity. They have made it very clear that even if it means war, so be it.”

Therefore, given the stakes are so high, the Australian government must answer the following questions:

1. Do you recognise the government of the People’s Republic of China is the sovereign government of one China? The only answer to this question is the position the Australian government expresses on the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade website: “The terms of our Joint Communiqué dictate the fundamental basis of Australia’s one-China policy. The Australian Government does not recognise the ROC as a sovereign state and does not regard the authorities in Taiwan as having the status of a national government. Dealings between Australian government officials and Taiwan, therefore, take place unofficially.” 
2. Does Australia support the peaceful resolution of China’s civil war between the PRC, and the ROC which is in control of Taiwan? The government’s answer to this question is predictable: it will not want to say it supports peaceful resolution, because that will enrage Washington, so it will say Australia supports the status quo.
3. What is the status quo? The only answer is the One China Policy expressed in the 1972 Joint Communiqué.
4. Why, therefore, did the Albanese government support a motion that goes against Australia’s official policy and has no other intent than to inflame tensions with our biggest trading partner over its one and only red line? For the same reason we are spending $368 billion on nuclear submarines—Australia does not have an independent foreign policy, but is subservient to the United States and United Kingdom (where IPAC was founded) which are stoking conflict with China.