Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The time has more than arrived for the freedom-loving countries of the world to unite in the name of freedom, in the name of their national sovereignty and in the name of world peace to counter the corrosive and growing pervasive influence of the Chinese communist dictatorship. At the outset, let it be understood that the Chinese people are as peace and freedom loving as all other peoples of the world. The issue is not the Chinese people; the issue is the Communist dictatorship under which the Chinese people have suffered for far too long.

Next year, the Chinese Communist Party will be 100 years old. The party has the sordid record of cruel repression, ruthless extrajudicial killings and labour camps in the naked pursuit of influence on the world stage for all the wrong reasons. Ten minutes is insufficient to set out the legacy of cruel, inhumane and illegal activities in which the communist dictatorship of China has engaged. Be it Tibet, Christians, students in Tiananmen Square, the Falong Gong, the barbaric forced organ harvesting of prisoners of conscience, the Uighurs, the slave labour camps, the ripping up of the UN-sanctioned Sino-UK agreement guaranteeing the freedom of the Hong Kongers or the expropriation and illegal claiming of the South China Sea islands for aggressive military purposes, the list goes on. The ugly, repressive social credit system which seeks to control the Chinese people, Australian journalists leaving China because of the regime's repression, the cyberattacks and the stealing of intellectual property are not the behavioural standard expected of a global player deserving of respect.

Nor is it deserving of respect to quietly remove the word 'peaceful' from the unification of China resolution at the recent National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party. Indeed, this change on the cusp of the centenary of the formation of the party is very worrisome and perturbing. One assumes the removal of that vital qualifying word 'peaceful' was not a typographical error. The removal of the word 'peaceful', deliberate as it must have been, should send alarm bells ringing. It begs the question: why was the word 'peaceful' removed?

The people of Taiwan deserve and need the unqualified support of all freedom-loving nations. Taiwan is a nation geographically smaller than my home state of Tasmania, but with a population equivalent to the Commonwealth of Australia. It is a fully fledged democracy. We need to stand in solidarity with the people of Taiwan. With the benefit of hindsight, the recognition of Beijing at the expense of Taipei, a demand of the communist dictatorship, was just the beginning of an ugly list of demands and concessions for which the freedom-loving countries of the world fell all those years ago. It is with regret that I recall my own government, albeit under different leadership, promoting an extradition treaty with the Chinese communist dictatorship, and mine being a lone voice of opposition but one which helped derail the proposal, much to the chagrin of some. That said, I confess that at the time I was still labouring under the misguided hope that with the opening of the Chinese economy there would follow the opening up personal freedoms and liberties. For me, an extradition treaty with a regime which was a dictatorship, which didn't believe in the rule of law and which had a 99.9 per cent conviction rate in trials and the death penalty was going way too far.

Concessions to encourage the expansion of liberties was a tactic worth trying, but with eyes wide open. It is a matter of regret that the freedom-loving nations of the world pursued economic gain and favouritism from the dictatorship whilst turning a blind eye to the well-known human rights abuses. Australia itself had an arrangement with the Chinese regime to have an annual human rights dialogue—a great initiative. But when it was unilaterally suspended by the communists, we didn't push back when we should have pushed back hard. When China expropriated the South China Sea islands for military purposes, the freedom-loving countries simply added millions of words to international dialogue but not a single practical act to halt or reverse the building of facilities on the illegally seized islands.

Despite the litany of egregious abuses, the world community allowed the communist dictatorship of China to have inappropriate influence over the World Health Organization. Let's not start on COVID-19 and the devastation it has wreaked on the rest of the world, for which it does need to be brought to account, or the consequences to nations seeking an international inquiry into COVID, like Australia being called 'the dog of America' or having unconscionable tariffs imposed as a not-so-subtle punishment and a warning to other nations should they pursue decent requests for answers to a devastating pandemic.

Then there is the undue influence on all bodies on the UN's human rights body. On 31 July 2015 the president of the International Olympic Committee announced that Beijing would be the host city of the 2022 Olympic Games. It was mistake to award China as the host five years ago, and it is a mistake if the International Olympic Committee proceed with them as the host in 2022. The 2022 Winter Olympics will be the last Olympics exempt from human rights principles being incorporated in host city contracts by the IOC, which will bind hosts to UN conventions from Paris 2024 onwards. China's hosting in 2022 is a glaring choice before the conventions become part of the contract. Recently 160 human rights advocacy groups delivered a joint letter to the chief of the International Olympic Committee, calling for Beijing to be removed as host of the games over its actions in Hong Kong and the detention of Uighurs in Xinjiang. British MP Sir Iain Duncan Smith, a co-chair of the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China, of which I'm pleased to be a member, rightfully asked that the IOC think again about hosting the Winter Olympics in China.

The time has come to draw a line in the sand and say enough is enough. The International Olympic Committee could provide much-needed leadership by reconsidering the holding of the Winter Olympics in China in 2022. Countries vie against each other to host the Olympics because of the economic and tourism benefits, along with the international credibility and prestige it brings. Why should the Olympic community bestow such undeserved prestige and credibility on this discredited dictatorship, with its legacy of human rights abuses and flouting of accepted civilised international standards of behaviour?

The similarities of human rights abuses, expropriation of territory and manipulation of international bodies to gain undeserved credibility are spookily reminiscent of events of some 80-plus years ago.

The insidious Belt and Road Initiative, which is a debt trap inflicted on less well-off nations to exert undue influence, needs to be called out. Thus far, 138 countries have become engaged in this debt trap. My colleague Senator Fierravanti-Wells was ahead of the game and called it out, and she was foolishly repudiated for her comments. History will affirm Senator Fierravanti-Wells for her courage and insight. When a sovereign state of our Commonwealth willingly signs up to the insidious Belt and Road Initiative it encourages the communist dictatorship peddling its debt trap to countries around the world. Having the imprimatur of Victoria is a great public relations coup for the regime and a great disservice to the nations and peoples that become entwined and entrapped in the initiative. The Labor Premier of Victoria should repudiate it, as he should reconsider whether the Chinese contractor shortlisted for the North East Link should even be allowed to tender. Similarly, the purchase by the Labor Premier of new trains built by exploited Uighur labour is reprehensible and should be stopped. To continue gives funding and credibility to the ugliness of slave labour camps and the communist regime which runs them. This is a company blacklisted by the US.

The time has come for the freedom-loving countries of the world to combine and stand in solidarity with each other to let the communist dictatorship of China know their activities of abuse and aggression will not be tolerated. The freedom-loving countries of the world need to act now, before it's too late. It's always worth standing up for freedom.