China

Book Review: The Avoidable War: The Dangers of a Catastrophic Conflict between the US and Xi Jinping’s China, by Kevin Rudd (Hatchette 2022)  The rise of a strong and confident China has had more implications for Australia than perhaps any other advanced country apart from the United States

There was barely concealed panic in Australia when news broke that China had struck a security agreement with Solomon Islands. What if this is really a basing deal that allows China to station military aircraft or warships permanently? Solomons Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare’s emphatic denial on

Solomon Islands has signed a security pact with China and set off a flurry of foreign policy chatter in Australia and the region. Understandably, the focus of the discussion is on why this has happened, what this means, what to do next, and of course, because Australia is in the midst of an election

Australia’s election campaign has been consumed by the Solomon-China security pact in recent days. Labor has cried “Pacific stuff up”, mocking the Coalition government’s Pacific Step-up policy to strengthen neighbourhood ties. In turn, the Coalition has seized on past comments about foreign

Labor has described Solomon Islands’ security pact with China as Australia’s biggest foreign policy failure in the Pacific since the Second World War, but this is hyperbole. Australia’s biggest foreign policy failure in the region – ever – is its failure to address (at both a national and

Among the many “days” celebrated by the international community, one entrant seems especially incongruous. “Mekong Day” was proclaimed by the Mekong River Commission’s (MRC) headquarters in Vientiane to celebrate the signature of the “Agreement on the Cooperation and Sustainable

Back to the future The Morrison government gave the development aid sector an unexpected surprise with a budget spending increase mostly in the Pacific, just as the latest crisis in Solomon Islands was occurring. There is still plenty of grumbling that this – perhaps parting gift given the

The Indo-Pacific maritime security order consists of international treaties, multilateral diplomatic forums and, increasingly, minilateral security initiatives. The first two are under stress due to China’s assertive behaviour in the maritime domain and have led to the formation of the latter.

News of an impending security agreement between Solomon Islands and China has alarmed Western nations concerned about China’s assertive influence in the region. But the reaction has underscored the risk that geopolitical competition itself could undermine the sovereignty of Pacific Island

“Coalition” is one of those politically loaded terms that the sovereignty-conscious member-states of ASEAN tend to avoid – especially in dealing with disputed claims in the South China Sea. Keeping the region away from direct conflict with its giant neighbour the People’s Republic of China

The enemy of my enemy is not necessarily my friend. Likewise, there may not be an instinctive alignment of my two adversaries. Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s reference to “arc of autocracy” and the “instinctive” alignment between Russia and China in the address at the Lowy Institute was

Polling by Russian Field at the end of February indicated that a majority of Russians (59 per cent) supported Vladimir Putin’s “special military operations” in Ukraine. Yet, the longer the war goes on in Ukraine, and the more restrictive international economic sanctions become, factors from

When the Chinese embassy in Ukraine hastily began the evacuation of its citizens much later than those of other nations, it seemed a sign that Beijing either wasn’t given advance notice of the Russian invasion, or at least failed to grasp the immediacy. In a call with Russian President Vladimir

Vladimir Putin’s ruthless bid to erase Ukraine’s nationhood and redraw the map in Europe is a direct attack on the foundations of the post-war rules-based order, from which Australia has benefitted more than most. A Russian fait accompli in Ukraine would also boost the idea that might makes

Wooing the neighbours The Morrison government has committed almost $700 million to new non-Covid initiatives in Southeast Asia over the past two years, seeking to rebuild regional ties largely in response to uncertainty about China. While that spending wasn’t specifically aimed at boosting

In September this year, UN member states will cast their votes for the next secretary-general of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU). While elections for bureaucratic positions in obscure, technical UN bodies normally pass unnoticed, the ITU has emerged as the major battleground in

As a resource-abundant country and a close neighbour, Myanmar has been a popular destination for Chinese investment. Although China has had a cosy time investing in Myanmar since 1988 when the military regime was internationally isolated, it is fair to argue that Chinese businesses in Myanmar faced

In 1971, two table tennis players – American Glenn Cowan and Zhuang Zedong from China – met on the tournament bus on the way to the world championships in Nagoya, Japan. The chance meeting between two athletes at a time when their respective countries were enduring a distant and icy

The events of the latter half of 2021 show that Beijing is willing to tolerate significant economic pain to deleverage its property sector. For the Chinese Communist Party, the financial and social risks posed by the current state of the real estate sector are existential. At the end of the second

On 16 September 2021 China lodged an application to join the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP). This immediately kicked-off a debate among trade watchers on the merits, as well as the benefits and risks of China joining the trade pact. In addition, the

When it comes to the realm of soft power and cultural diplomacy, China’s efforts are often seen as either lacklustre or counterintuitive. Dwarfed by the cultural juggernauts of Japan and South Korea, Chinese cinema and music struggle to find Western audiences (video games are a very different

Tensions with China over the South China Sea have prompted Indonesia to invite maritime security officials from five ASEAN member states – Brunei, the Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore and Vietnam – to meet in February to discuss a possible joint response to Beijing’s growing assertiveness.

The promise was pain. Anger China, so warned Beijing’s “wolf warrior” diplomats, and Australia’s economy would suffer. But for all the threats, tariffs and embargoes, Roland Rajah found the bark had resulted in only a small bite. That doesn’t mean that China’s trade sanctions haven’t

The world is being transformed by the Internet of Things (the IoT) as ever more devices and activities are linked through the internet and endowed with computing power. This transformation brings an exponential rise in the security challenges inherent in digital connections, especially connections