/qresearch/ -  Q Research

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China’s conflict with Japan occurred against the backdrop of Mao Zedong’s Communist revolution against the Nationalist government of the Guomindang – with the GMD left to handle the vast majority of the war effort and incur the bulk of casualties, which numbered in the millions.

Four years after the Japanese surrender, GMD leader Chiang Kai-shek fled China for Taiwan and the CCP formed government in ­Beijing.

In The Australian last month, Chinese ambassador Xiao Qian invoked this history by recalling China and Australia fighting “side by side” against the Japanese to declare “Taiwan’s return to China must not be denied”.

Speaking from the SCO on Monday, Putin accused Western leaders of historical revisionism.

“Historical truth is being distorted and suppressed to suit their current political agendas,” he said. “Japanese militarism is being revived under the pretext of imaginary Russian or Chinese threats, while in Europe, including Germany, steps are being taken towards the remilitarisation of the continent, with little regard for historical parallels.”

Former US ambassador to the United Nations and national security adviser John Bolton wrote in the Australian Financial Review on Monday, making a public appeal for Mr Andrews and Mr Carr to boycott the event.

“Andrews and Carr should reconsider their decisions to attend, as should other present or former officials of the very nations China and its allies threaten. That is not too much to ask,” he wrote.

“Legitimising the Communist view of World War II strengthens Xi Jinping’s regime internationally and with China’s own population. Domestically, it enhances Xi’s ability to stifle internal dissent not just about history, but also about current policy issues.

“We currently see a lot of rewriting of history under way, some of it in democracies, but that is no warrant to legitimise what Beijing has attempted to do with this and prior commemorations involving World War II, and much more.”

The Chinese embassy in Australia was contacted for comment.

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/taiwan-slams-china-military-parade-attended-by-expremiers-carr-andrews/news-story/b82df51ab545281fba03b53a80c4e294

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Opinion: Why are Carr and Andrews legitimising China’s axis of authoritarianism?

The entire event is intended to rewrite history and advance and normalise both the Chinese Communist Party’s official history and to presage the future.

John Bolton - Sep 1, 2025

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In its typically authoritarian way, China (or, more accurately, its Communist Party) is commemorating the 80th anniversary of World War II’s end with a big military parade on September 3. The whole gang will be there to celebrate with Xi Jinping; Vladimir Putin and Kim Jung Un lead the guest list, but most Western nations will send only low-level representatives from their embassies. Nonetheless, Xi is basking in the moment.

Why then are former Victorian Labor Premier Daniel Andrews and former NSW Premier and federal Foreign Minister Bob Carr joining the festivities? Perhaps more importantly, are they travelling at the behest of the Albanese government, or with at least its tacit blessing?

More broadly, how should free countries and citizens respond to the propaganda exercises that authoritarian states regularly stage? We have seen enough such exercises over the past century to understand that more is at stake here than just watching a parade.

Remarkably, Carr justifies his travel to Beijing by asking, “Why shouldn’t I go and talk to two think tanks and talk up the commitment of the Australian government to the relationship, and to quote the prime minister himself?” Fair enough, but why not go on any of the year’s other 365 days to do exactly the same thing?

Andrews signed up Victoria for China’s Belt-and-Road Initiative in 2019, a decision later reversed by then-Prime Minister Scott Morrison. Belt-and-Road is central to Beijing’s ongoing “debt diplomacy” strategy, initially intended to snare unsuspecting Third World countries into apparently attractive financial terms for, say, infrastructure projects, but ultimately serving to strengthen Beijing’s grip on recipient-country economies and governments.

History wars point to China’s future

China’s real political objectives here certainly involve marking Japan’s 1945 defeat, but even that goal embodies a heavily slanted view of what actually led to victory. Scholars and political leaders have widely diverging views on how the respective Chinese combatants actually waged their side of the Sino-Japanese war, which effectively started World War II in the Pacific region. We can be sure that this week’s events will attribute China’s share of victory to Mao Tse-tung and the Communist Party, essentially ignoring the role played by China’s legitimate government under Chiang Kai-shek.

I acknowledge that this is a much-debated issue, but the weight of history suggests that Chiang’s Nationalist forces, inept and corrupt as they may have been, bore the brunt of main-force fighting – and the attendant casualties and destruction – against Japan. Communist efforts, by contrast, were largely guerilla actions against the Japanese, as often as not aimed at enhancing Communist efforts in the civil war with the Nationalists, after defeating Japan.

Legitimising the Communist view of World War II strengthens Xi Jinping’s regime internationally and with China’s own population. Domestically, it enhances Xi’s ability to stifle internal dissent not just about history, but also about current policy issues. We currently see a lot of rewriting of history underway, some of it in democracies, but that is no warrant to legitimise what Beijing has attempted to do with this and prior commemorations involving World War II, and much more.

Most importantly of all, China is concentrating on projecting its future leading international role through this celebration. It is no mistake that Beijing’s official list of attending heads of state, no honour roll of democracies, begins with Putin and Kim. This century’s main threat to America and its partners is the rapidly emerging axis between China and Russia, and their associated outriders like North Korea, Iran, and Belarus. It is no surprise, therefore, that the leaders of Iran and Belarus will also be attending.

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As with so many Cold War-era parades through Moscow’s Red Square, this week’s parade through Tiananmen Square will doubtless showcase new and powerful Chinese weapons systems, including possibly missiles capable of reaching Guam. This is hardly a way to celebrate the restoration of peace after World War II, but that is obviously not what Xi is targeting.

Not only is China stressing its military might, but also its diplomatic and political clout, through consultations among Xi, Putin and Kim, and a meeting of its Shanghai Cooperation Council, which includes Russia, India, Pakistan and Iran. India’s Prime Minister Modi is a particularly significant catch for Xi, a leader now shunned by the Trump administration.

In free societies, dissent is admirable. There will be no dissent in Beijing this week. The entire event is intended to advance, legitimise and normalise both the Communists’ official history and to presage the future. Andrews and Carr should reconsider their decisions to attend, as should other present or former officials of the very nations China and its allies threaten. That is not too much to ask.

John Bolton served as national security adviser under US President Donald Trump and is the author of "The Room Where It Happened: A White House Memoir".

https://www.afr.com/policy/foreign-affairs/daniel-andrews-bob-carr-john-bolton-china-axis-authoritarianism-20250901-p5mrde

https://qresear.ch/?q=John+Bolton

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Australian ambassador to China to miss Xi Jinping military parade

WILL GLASGOW - 2 September 2025

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Australia’s ambassador to China, Scott Dewar, will be more than 2000km away from Xi ­Jinping’s huge military parade in Beijing on Wednesday in a ­pointed diplo­matic snub by the ­Albanese ­government that underscores Canberra’s deep concerns about the increasingly assertive behaviour of the People’s Liberation Army.

On Wednesday morning, the Chinese President will give a speech in the heart of Beijing, using China’s World War II history to cast his rising power as the champion of a new global order that is displacing America’s global leadership.

More than 10,000 troops, hundreds of pieces of ground equipment and more than 100 PLA Airforce jets are scheduled to appear in the 70-minute military parade.

Russian President Vladimir Putin – Mr Xi’s closest partner on the international stage, whom he met with again on Tuesday – will again be at Beijing’s Gate of Heavenly Peace as a guest of honour as the Chinese leader tells the assembled leaders, many of them dictators, to cherish peace.

A decade ago, Australia was represented at the same event by minister for veteran affairs ­Michael Ronaldson. This time Australia will be officially represented well below ambassadorial level by the defence attache and political counsellor at the Australian embassy in Beijing.

“There’s no way we would send a government representative to join Putin. It’s a very conscious calibration,” said a source involved in the government’s decision to demote Australia’s representation. “It’s deliberate,” another government source told The ­Australian.

To underline the point, Australia’s ambassador, Mr Dewar, on Wednesday morning will be ­almost as far away from Beijing as you can go without leaving China’s borders, addressing the Australian business community in the southern city of Guangzhou.

“This unique event will provide valuable insights into Australia-China relations,” promises AustCham China, the main Australian business lobby in the country, which has organised the meeting.

Among those toasting China’s brave new world in a hybrid event that will mark the defeat of ­Imperial Japan in World War II, as well as unveiling Mr Xi’s latest war-fighting kit will be Putin, North Korea’s dynastic dictator Kim Jung-un, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian and Myanmar’s junta leader, Min Aung ­Hlaing.

Beijing’s propagandists have insisted the display of China’s increasingly potent military capabilities – new hypersonic missiles, new tanks, new stealth fighters – will be a manifestation of the world’s increasingly peaceful ­future. Two former Labor state leaders, Bob Carr and Dan Andrews, each Labor Party cult figures with their own personal China agendas, have muddied the Albanese government’s message.

Sources in the Albanese government have stressed that they are in Beijing in a “personal capacity” and that they have not co-ordinated with Australian officials.

“It’s unfortunate,” said a former senior Australian diplomat, noting Mr Carr and Mr Andrews have dealt themselves into what is “ultimately a propaganda exercise”.

“There are useful idiots in our system,” another former senior Australian official said.

China’s government is delighted to have the “former statesmen” along.

Some in Washington are wondering if the two Labor figures are attending with the tacit support of Canberra.

‘Xi hit the nail on the head’

Ahead of the parade, Mr Xi has fashioned himself into what the China-focused Indian analyst Manoj Kewalramani has dubbed “China’s story-teller-in-chief.

The main thrust of Mr Xi’s narrative is that China’s World War II experience – the “great victory of the Chinese People’s War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression”, in Communist Party speak – marked a “historic turning point for the Chinese nation”, as the People’s Daily recently declared.

The victory allowed China “to transition from the deep crisis it had fallen into since modern times toward great rejuvenation,” the party’s flagship daily continued.

It is, in the words of the British historian Rana Mitter, “China’s good war”, a rare occasion in the country’s bloody 20th century when Chinese soldiers were fighting a foreign invader rather than other Chinese soldiers, or the Chinese population itself.

Mr Xi, a better Leninist than historian, distils an instructive political message from the war.

“The Communist Party of China’s role as the mainstay was the key to the Chinese people’s victory in the War of Resistance Against Japan,” Mr Xi has said.

“General Secretary Xi Jinping hit the nail on the head,” the People’s Daily declared.

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Outside of China’s censored information world, most historians assess things differently. The Communist Party, which did not take power until 1949, did perform an important support role in the war against Japan, waging a ­guerrilla campaign against the Japanese. But the majority of the fighting was by the Nationalist army, led by China’s wartime ­leader Chiang Kai-shek.

Assistance from America, the British Empire and, right at the end, the Soviet Union, was also crucial.

No one should be tuning into China’s military parade for an ­accurate telling of the country’s war history.

What they will see is a message about the country as it is today: ruled by the Communist Party “with Xi at its core”, in the phrase repeated over and over by Beijing’s propaganda machine.

“It’s very much a Xi Jinping, look-at-me thing,” a former senior Australian official told The ­Australian.

Mr Xi believes China’s World War II history can give his country the respectability, and influence, in the international system he believes it deserves.

Donald Trump, conducting an ongoing assault on the international architecture America set up after World War II and undermining China-focused groups such as the Quad, has helped to set the scene magnificently.

“In a weird irony, China is using its status as a war time ally to argue that it is now the status quo when it comes to global order,” says Professor Mitter, an expert on China’s war time history at Harvard ­University.

“World War II is being used as the framing to argue that China is now the real inheritor of the 1945 global order.

“Whether those who see China’s actions in the South China Sea and off the coast of Taiwan would necessarily agree with that is another matter.”

The pomp and the kit

The world’s biggest military remains one that takes martial pomp extremely seriously.

In the lead up to the big day, Yao Jiuwei, a marine in the People’s Liberation Army Navy, told Chinese state media that he was inspired to enlist after seeing the display of goose steeping and steel at the same parade a decade ago.

“I was running on a treadmill at my university – Harbin Sport University in Heilongjiang province – and was watching a live broadcast of the grand parade in Beijing that marked the 70th anniversary of the victory of the Chinese People’s War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression,” he told the China Daily. “It impressed me deeply and made me truly want to become a soldier.“

A few years later, he watched enviously as other Chinese soldiers marched in formation in the parade to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party.

“Now, I am here, training for the coming parade. It feels like my dream is coming true,” he told the Chinese state masthead.

Australia’s defence attache won’t just be taking notes about the precision of Chinese marching or the artistry of the giant, didactic floral arrangements Beijing has commissioned for the occasion.

The PLA is going to be unveiling some formidable new kit. China’s new stealth bomber, the J-20, will be displayed while bomber formations will fly overhead.

A range of new hypersonic missiles and combat drones will also be shown off, many with obvious capabilities for targeting US and allied forces in the Pacific and for waging war on Taiwan.

There will also be new tanks, electronic warfare equipment and electronic jamming systems, according to a spokesman at China’s Central Military Commission.

The parade and an accompanying propaganda push in a recent five-episode documentary series on China’s military development “sends a clear message that a stronger Chinese military ensures a more peaceful world,” the Global Times recently declared. Many of China’s neighbours disagree.

Both the Japanese and Taiwanese governments have urged “like minded” partners to keep away from the event. Both Tokyo and Taipei know only too well that Beijing’s military might is used for more than just parades.

Representation from the liberal democratic world will be even more threadbare than a decade ago. South Korea’s then president was along for the 2015 event, but this time the country’s new leader Lee Jae Myung is keeping away.

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Whoever offends China must be punished

Much of China’s 1.4 billion population has been getting in the mood for the big day.

With a nudge from Chinese state media, hashtags about the preparations for the parade have been flooding China’s internet. There is much gushing about clips showing new high tech weaponry.

The Communist Youth league shared a video that went viral showing PLA Airforce jets flying over the imperial-era Temple of Heaven. “The romanticisation of China’s military strength is clear: fighter jets glowing in the dawn light, dazzling sky formations, and military choreography executed with perfect precision,” wrote Manya Koetse, an expert on Chinese social media and founder of What’s On Weibo.

Chinese cinemas have been full of teary crowds watching Dead to Rights, this summer’s blockbuster movie about the Japanese massacre in Nanjing in 1937, one of the most painful memories in China’s modern history. “My tears flowed out at the end of the screening,” Guo Xiaoling, an audience member at a recent screening in Beijing, told The Australian.

“Walking out of the cinema, seeing the flow of people and vehicles on the street, I felt I was back from a nightmare.”

“The hatred (towards Japanese) is deeply engraved in our Chinese bones.”

There is nothing manufactured about the suffering of the Chinese people in World War Two and under Japanese occupation.

Historians estimate 20 million Chinese were killed in the war against the Japanese. Most were civilians.

China’s efforts, led by its Nationalist government, helped tie down much of Japan’s war machine, allowing America, Australia and other allies to ultimately successfully defend the Pacific.

But many liberal Chinese voices worry that Mr Xi’s government is using that wartime history to justify its own militarism and that of close partners, above all Putin’s Russia. Some have accused the Nanjing massacre themed film of “brewing hatred”.

Mr Xi has declared that sort of talk, and much besides, “historical nihilism”. The Communist Party’s Political and Legal Affairs Commission recently warned citizens to “be vigilant against undercurrents and defend historical truth”. “Despicable” social media accounts have been banned in an effort to scrub the Chinese internet ahead of the parade.

Beijing has also linked the WWII events to the Communist Party’s longstanding claims over Taiwan. Last week a Chinese academic at Beijing’s prestigious Renmin university accused Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party of becoming increasingly “Nazi-like” in a commentary piece in the People’s Daily.

In doing so, he echoed in the Communist Party’s flagship paper, the chilling, warped argument used by Putin to justify his Ukraine invasion.

Some nationalist Chinese make the link between World War II and Taiwan themselves. At a museum in Dalian that sits in a former Japanese occupation era prison, visitors are encouraged to leave messages summarising their impressions. They are then posted on a remembrance wall.

On a recent visit by The Australian, there were comforting messages for China’s neighbours. “Pray for peace!” wrote one.

But other visitors offered a warning for countries, such as Australia, without any direct territorial disputes with Beijing. “Whoever offends China, even if they are far away, they must be punished.”

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/world/one-absent-ambassador-and-two-useful-idiots/news-story/23f681d77266029c64badccb886aa2aa

https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/national/taiwan-furry-as-bob-carr-daniel-andrews-to-attend-chinese-military-parade/news-story/2ea4f6d2b69f76161edfe1b70bc26575

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COMMENTARY: China’s WWII victory parade is a supreme fiction

MILES YU - September 02, 2025

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This week the Chinese Communist Party will orchestrate a grand military parade in Tiananmen Square to commemorate victory over Japan in World War II.

Ostensibly a tribute to wartime heroism, this display is, in truth, a monumental distortion of history, a calculated fiction meant to glorify the party, vilify its contemporary adversaries and mislead its people.

At the heart of this charade lies the falsehood that the CCP was the principal fighting force against Japanese aggression during the war. This claim is a brazen lie.

From 1937 to 1945, it was the Nationalist government, under Chiang Kai-shek, that bore the brunt of Japan’s military assault. Nationalist forces, not the Chinese communists, fought nearly every major battle and sustained more than 3.5 million military casualties. In stark contrast, the CCP, holed up in its Yan’an stronghold, sustained minuscule losses. Only one high-ranking communist officer, Zuo Quan, is confirmed to have died in a skirmish with the Japanese.

Japanese casualty data confirms the truth: Of the estimated one million-plus Japanese casualties in China, virtually all fell to Nationalist or Allied hands, not the communists.

The main cause of the CCP’s inaction against the Japanese invading forces is its ideological symbiosis with the Soviet Union, which prohibited the CCP from actively fighting Japan during World War II.

In late August 1939, Josef Stalin signed a non-aggression pact with Adolf Hitler, whose ally in Asia was Japan, and despite the Nazis’ subsequent betrayal of the pact, the Soviets remained vigilant against any Allied efforts using their territory, resources or affiliated forces to fight Japan in Asia.

This was because of the notorious April 1941 Soviet-Japanese Neutrality Pact, which Moscow strictly enforced until the very last days of the war.

As such, the Soviets and their CCP clients were effectively bound to a policy of non-confrontation against the Japanese in China during most of the war. Any military action by the CCP would have jeopardised the USSR’s neutrality pact with Tokyo, and thus Mao Zedong and the CCP carefully avoided real conflict with the Japanese. As a result, the Japanese military and the CCP forces virtually coexisted in the same large swathes of Japanese-occupied North China, where there was little to no communist resistance.

Mao focused not on liberation or resistance but on quietly building his army from a few thousand to more than one million troops by war’s end, all without serious engagement but with the goal of defeating the legitimate, US-supported Chinese Nationalist government in the post-war era.

Even when American efforts, via the Office of Strategic Services, sought to arm and train guerrilla resistance in communist-held zones, the CCP obstructed operations. The brutal killing of Office of Strategic Services agent Captain John Birch stands as a grim testament to the CCP’s duplicity and hostility toward genuine anti-Japanese resistance that threatened its ambitions.

The party’s rare foray into combat, ie, the much-touted “Hundred Regiments Offensive” of 1940, was neither decisive nor heroic. To fake its anti-Japanese feat, the CCP claimed massive Japanese casualties because of this campaign, as many as 46,000, but Japan’s casualty records suggest the real number was less than 500. Mao later even denounced the operation as a strategic blunder, and its commander, Peng Dehuai, was purged for, among other things, violating Mao’s preference for strategic concealment in 1940.

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Today’s CCP regime continues to weaponise historical memory. Museums in China’s wartime capital, Chongqing, and elsewhere have been redesigned to promote the illusion of a CCP-American wartime alliance.

They exhibit fabricated photos and false narratives, airbrushing out the true partnership between the US and Chiang’s Nationalists. American figures such as General Joseph Stilwell and the Flying Tigers are co-opted into CCP mythology, while the party viewed US personnel as threats and even targeted them for assassination.

The entire upcoming parade is a political theatre, a state-forged spectacle masquerading as remembrance. The irony of holding it in Tiananmen Square, where countless lives were crushed in 1989, is not lost on those who know China’s real history.

Although the CCP claims to honour 15 million Chinese victims of the war, it remains silent about the more than 70 million who perished at its own hands through purges, famines, forced labour, terror campaigns and continuing repressions.

A regime responsible for more Chinese deaths than any foreign power has no moral standing to speak of peace or sacrifice. There will be no banners for the dead of the Great Leap Forward, the Cultural Revolution or the Tiananmen Square Massacre.

No tribute will be paid to the countless intellectuals, farmers or workers crushed by Maoist campaigns or imprisoned for dissent. This parade will honour ghosts, but only the ones the party deems politically useful.

If China wishes to truly honour those who resisted Japan, it should salute the Nationalist soldiers who fought and died, the American airmen of the Flying Tigers, the brave men and women of the US armed forces and OSS, and the millions of unarmed civilians who endured occupation. A truthful commemoration would also acknowledge the victims of communist tyranny, the real cost of the CCP’s rise to power.

To attend this spectacle is to legitimatise a fraud. No foreign leader, especially from a democratic nation, should grace this falsified history with their presence. To do so is to betray the memory of those who fought fascism and to reward a regime built on the bones of its own people.

What will unfold on September 3 is not remembrance but propaganda – an insult draped in flags and uniforms, parading not history but deception. It is a lie in motion. Like all lies, it demands to be exposed.

Miles Yu is director of the China Centre at the Hudson Institute.

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/commentary/chinas-wwii-victory-parade-is-a-supreme-fiction/news-story/7ee4713b6f5e9c4e0f98834533e1349d

https://www.hudson.org/experts/1356-miles-yu

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Former Victorian premier Daniel Andrews meets with Xi Jinping

Emily Bennett and Richard Wood - Sep 3, 2025

Former Victorian premier Daniel Andrews has been seen shaking hands with Chinese President Xi Jinping prior to the nation's grand military parade.The parade, which boasts other guests including Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Un, marks the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II.

Andrews was accompanied by former NSW premier and foreign minister Bob Carr.

The two are reported to be among the 10,000 strong crowd watching the event in Beijing's Tiananmen Square.

The former politicians, who have a record of forging links with China, are attending in a personal capacity.

The parade will showcase China's newest warfighting kit, including hypersonic missiles, tanks, stealth fighters in a display of the communist ruled nation's military arsenal.

Analyst Neil Thomas, from the Asia Society Policy Institute think tank, told Today this morning the parade had drawn a "rogues' gallery" of authoritarian world leaders, including North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Un and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

He said the attendance of Carr and Daniels would likely bolster the Chinese government's efforts to promote the event, and its claims China was the major force behind Japan's defeat in World War II.

"They're (Carr and Daniels) not representing Australia, although, of course, they did hold senior roles in state governments before.

"So it's certainly the case that China is looking to use their participation to bolster the international reach and legitimacy of this parade."

In addition to the North Korean and Russian dictators, the leaders of hardline regimes such as Iran and Belarus will also be watching the parade.

"The fact that the company you have at this parade is a rogues gallery of international leaders like Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong-Un, it certainly doesn't leave a good taste in your mouth," Thomas said.

The federal government confirmed senior Australian officials will not be attending.

https://www.9news.com.au/world/chinese-militiary-parade-tiananmen-gate-in-beijing-2025-in-pictures/671b744c-4d4e-491f-8b33-62f056495362

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Dan Andrews shakes Xi's hand at Beijing parade

Will Glasgow - Sep 03, 2025

Former Labor premier Daniel Andrews has joined world leaders and dictators on the red carpet ahead of the military parade in Tiananmen Square in Beijing.

Mr Andrews shook Mr Xi’s hand, then that of Mr Xi’s wife Peng Liyuan, shortly before the commemorations began.

Andrews later appeared prominently in a group photograph that featured world leaders, which included Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korea’s dynastic dictator Kim Jong-un.

Andrews, a Labor Party cult figure with his own personal China agenda, has muddied the Albanese government’s diplomatic message by attending in a “personal capacity”.

Also among those joining Xi, Putin and Jong-un to admire China’s military hardware will be Iranian president Masoud Pezeshkian and Myanmar’s junta leader Min Aung Hlaing.

Australia’s Ambassador to China Scott Dewar will be more than 2000 km away from Xi’s parade in a pointed diplomatic snub by the Albanese government that underscores Canberra’s deep concerns about the increasingly assertive behaviour of the People’s Liberation Army.

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/world/xi-showcases-militarys-potent-new-weaponry-in-show-of-extravaganza/live-coverage/5bae30bc5ef7c6383b68e8dce9edf6b2#/entry/12911259

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Dan Andrews poses alongside Xi, Putin and Kim Jong-un

Nick Newling and Paul Sakkal - September 3, 2025

Former Victorian premier Daniel Andrews has posed in a group photo with North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un and Russian President Vladimir Putin before a parade in Beijing to commemorate the end of World War II, after shaking hands with China’s leader Xi Jinping on the ceremony’s red carpet.

Held to mark 80 years since Japan surrendered, the parade featured a show of military strength that former NSW premier Bob Carr, who is in China for the broader commemorations, decided to skip and called “Soviet-style”.

Both Andrews and Carr came under heavy scrutiny for their planned attendance from both sides of the Australian political spectrum and were described as “pawns” of the Chinese regime by Coalition MPs.

Andrews stood in the back row of an official image of the event that included numerous country leaders, just metres behind Kim.

Carr was previously believed to be attending the event, but told this masthead he would attend separate indoor events following the parade, and address two Chinese international relations think tanks instead.

“I told the Chinese I wouldn’t be attending the parade but that I’d like to accelerate arrangements to talk to think tanks,” Carr said from China.

“I had to make a decision on whether I was attracted to a traditional Soviet-style military parade or if I wanted to opt for the meetings with delegations, a unique constellation from South-East Asia. I opted for the meetings.”

Carr’s decision meant Andrews, whose Victorian government controversially signed up to China’s Belt and Road agreement, was the only Australian politician invited to the military showcase who was comfortable attending. An official from the Australian embassy is attending other events related to the commemoration.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was twice asked about Andrews’ attendance at the parade during question time on Wednesday.

“The Australian government did have a representative there,” Albanese said. “The Australian government did have a representative 10 years ago [at the 70th anniversary celebrations]. That was a minister in the [Coalition] government. Our government chose that [sending a minister] would not be the case.”

Former Queensland premier Annastacia Palaszczuk said Carr and Andrews’ attendance at the commemoration events was a mistake, before Carr declared he would not be going to the parade. “If it were me, it’d be a definite N-O,” Palaszczuk told Sky News on Wednesday.

“I respect Dan, I respect Bob. But I think they’ve just gone the next level. Go there for a holiday, do your business talks, but there’s no need to attend this military parade.”

Both opposition home affairs spokesman Andrew Hastie and Nationals leader David Littleproud described the pair as “pawns” of the Chinese regime.

“They’re being used by the Chinese regime because they have influence with the Albanese government,” Littleproud said on Sky. “That’s why they’re invited. They’re going because of their own egos. The reality is this is a military parade, where not even the Australian ambassador will be representing Australia there, won’t even be in the city to be near this military parade.“

The photo is set to catapult Andrews’ business clout in China, where portraits of Xi Jinping are ubiquitous.

Andrews spent $416,000 of taxpayers’ funding on six trips to China as premier - more than he spent visiting any other country - before and after Victoria signed on to Beijing’s $1.5 trillion Belt and Road infrastructure initiative in 2019.

The state government’s disclosure logs reveal he witnessed deals between Chemist Warehouse and Alibaba, helped secure a $130 million partnership between medical technology specialist Compumedics and Chinese medical provider Health 100, lobbied for direct daily flights from Beijing and Sichuan to Melbourne, and the extension of a sponsorship deal between the Australian Open and Chinese liquor giant Luzhou Laojiao.

In early 2024, after resigning as premier, he registered two companies, Glencairn Street and Wedgetail Partners, the latter of which he runs with his former multicultural adviser, Marty Mei. Mei, who solicited political donations from the Chinese community, travelled on each trip to China with Andrews as premier.

Glencairn Street and Wedgetail Partners, which reportedly specialise in foreign investment, have no website or contact details. Andrews and Mei did not respond to requests for comment.

Andrews was contacted for comment.

https://www.theage.com.au/politics/federal/dan-andrews-poses-alongside-xi-putin-and-kim-jong-un-20250903-p5ms37.html

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/world/xi-showcases-militarys-potent-new-weaponry-in-show-of-extravaganza/live-coverage/5bae30bc5ef7c6383b68e8dce9edf6b2#/entry/12911259

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Carr skips military parade, as Andrews joins Xi on red carpet

Paul Sakkal - 3 September 2025

Bob Carr says he elected not to attend the “Soviet-style” military parade at which former Victorian premier Daniel Andrews shook the hand of Chinese President Xi Jinping and stood in a leaders’ photograph behind North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un.

Carr was previously believed to have been attending the parade as one of only two Australians on the guest list. He wrote an opinion piece this week explaining why he accepted an invitation to Beijing. But he confirmed to this masthead minutes ago that he was not at the parade attended by Russian President Vladimir Putin and other pro-China leaders.

Carr is attending separate indoor events later in the day to mark the 80th anniversary of China’s role in World War II. He is also addressing two Chinese international relations think tanks.

“I told the Chinese I wouldn’t be attending the parade but that I’d like to accelerate arrangements to talk to think-tanks,” Carr said from China.

“I had to make a decision on whether I was attracted to a traditional Soviet-style military parade or if I wanted to opt for the meetings with delegations, a unique constellation from South East Asia. I opted for the meetings.”

Carr’s decision meant Andrews, whose Victorian government controversially signed up to China’s Belt and Road Infrastructure agreement, was the only Australian politician attending the military showcase.

Opposition home affairs spokesman Andrew Hastie labelled Andrews a “nice little pawn” of China’s.

https://www.theage.com.au/world/asia/china-military-parade-live-updates-victory-day-parade-begins-in-beijing-as-xi-jinping-flanked-by-putin-kim-jong-un-on-arrival-former-victorian-premier-daniel-andrews-in-attendance-20250903-p5ms0i.html?post=p5971a#p5971a

https://x.com/bobjcarr/status/1963067026697810220

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Donald J. Trump Truth

The big question to be answered is whether or not President Xi of China will mention the massive amount of support and “blood” that The United States of America gave to China in order to help it to secure its FREEDOM from a very unfriendly foreign invader. Many Americans died in China’s quest for Victory and Glory. I hope that they are rightfully Honored and Remembered for their Bravery and Sacrifice! May President Xi and the wonderful people of China have a great and lasting day of celebration. Please give my warmest regards to Vladimir Putin, and Kim Jong Un, as you conspire against The United States of America. PRESIDENT DONALD J. TRUMP

https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/115137717177283585

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No security briefing before Andrews’ Beijing trip where he posed alongside Putin, Kim Jong-un

Paul Sakkal - September 3, 2025

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Former Victorian premier Daniel Andrews did not seek diplomatic advice before attending China’s anti-Western show of military might in Beijing, according to official sources, where he posed for a photo metres from dictators Kim Jong-un and Vladimir Putin.

In a move that stunned many in the federal government, Andrews shook President Xi Jinping’s hand on the red carpet in Tiananmen Square, before posing for a “family photo” near leaders that also included the Iranian president and Myanmar’s junta leader.

Official sources not authorised to speak on the record said Andrews did not ask the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade or anyone else in the government for advice on personal security or how to protect Australia’s national interest when talking to Chinese officials.

Andrews’ attendance at the ceremony, which marked 80 years since Japan’s surrender at the end of World War II, was condemned by former Queensland Labor premier Annastacia Palaszczuk as a step too far, and his appearance in the group photo with dictators and leaders of rogue states shocked Albanese government ministers.

Former NSW premier Bob Carr, who also travelled to China for the event, chose to skip the military parade due to what he called its “Soviet-style” aesthetic.

Andrews was contacted for comment but has not made any public remarks since it was revealed last Friday that he would attend the parade, which Chinese propaganda has cast as a victory for China rather than Western allies.

Albanese declined to endorse or condemn Andrews’ presence in Beijing, saying only that the former premier was “not meeting them” when asked if Andrews should be at an event with Putin or Kim, both of whom have been condemned by Australia and on the world stage for their disregard of the international rule of law.

Australia sent the embassy’s defence attache to some of the ceremonies, but Andrews was the only Australian dignitary at the parade.

Labor has sought to strike a balance with China, softening its tone to boost trade at the same time as procuring AUKUS nuclear submarines to deter the Asian superpower that seeks to dominate the Indo-Pacific.

Albanese travelled to China to meet Xi in July and spruiked warmer ties, but the government did not want to be anywhere near the parade where Xi hosted Putin and Kim and a raft of other anti-Western national leaders.

Andrews, a long-time ally of Albanese from the same Left faction, advised the prime minister on debate tactics before the last election, and the pair caught up for lunch at Melbourne’s Gimlet restaurant in June.

Questions about Andrews’ trip to Beijing plagued debate in Canberra on Wednesday. Albanese was twice asked about Andrews’ attendance at the parade during question time on Wednesday.

“The Australian government did have a representative there,” Albanese said. “The Australian government did have a representative 10 years ago [at the 70th anniversary celebrations]. That was a minister in the [Coalition] government. Our government chose that [sending a minister] would not be the case.”

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Carr said he would attend separate indoor events following the parade and address two Chinese international relations think tanks instead of going to the parade.

“I told the Chinese I wouldn’t be attending the parade but that I’d like to accelerate arrangements to talk to think tanks,” Carr said from Beijing. “I had to make a decision on whether I was attracted to a traditional Soviet-style military parade or if I wanted to opt for the meetings with delegations.”

When asked if he had sought a briefing before flying to Beijing, Carr said there were Australian diplomats at the events he attended.

Palaszczuk said Carr and Andrews’ attendance at the commemoration events was a mistake. “If it were me, it’d be a definite N-O,” Palaszczuk told Sky News on Wednesday.

“I respect Dan, I respect Bob. But I think they’ve just gone the next level. Go there for a holiday, do your business talks, but there’s no need to attend this military parade.”

Victoria’s Emergency Services Minister Vicki Ward said it was a matter for Andrews and pushed back on questions of whether it was appropriate.

“What’s the connotation?” Ward said at a press conference earlier on Wednesday. “He’s going as a private individual, and these are choices he’s made as a private individual.”

She said it was important to maintain good, healthy relationships with other countries in the region.

One Victorian Labor MP, speaking anonymously to be frank, said it was a bad look.

Labor MPs were not willing to go on record criticising a successful former premier, but several were privately shocked.

“It was quite sad really to see a provincial leader being used in this way,” one told this masthead on the condition of anonymity.

Both opposition home affairs spokesman Andrew Hastie and Nationals leader David Littleproud described Andrews and Carr as “pawns” of the Chinese regime.

The image of Andrews standing two rows behind Kim in Xi’s official group photo of foreign leaders and former leaders is set to boost the former premier’s business clout in China, where portraits of the Chinese president are ubiquitous.

Andrews spent $416,000 of taxpayers’ funding on six trips to China as premier – more than on any other country – before and after Victoria signed on to Beijing’s $1.5 trillion Belt and Road infrastructure initiative in 2019.

The state government’s disclosure logs reveal he witnessed deals between Chemist Warehouse and Alibaba, helped secure a $130 million partnership between medical technology specialist Compumedics and Chinese medical provider Health 100, lobbied for direct daily flights from Beijing and Sichuan to Melbourne, and the extension of a sponsorship deal between the Australian Open and Chinese liquor giant Luzhou Laojiao.

In early 2024, after resigning as premier, he registered two companies, Glencairn Street and Wedgetail Partners, the latter of which he runs with his former multicultural adviser, Marty Mei. Mei, who solicited political donations from the Chinese community and helped strike the Belt and Road deal, travelled on each trip to China with Andrews as premier.

Glencairn Street and Wedgetail Partners, which reportedly specialise in foreign investment, have no website or contact details. Andrews and Mei did not respond to requests for comment.

https://www.theage.com.au/politics/federal/dan-andrews-poses-alongside-xi-putin-and-kim-jong-un-20250903-p5ms37.html

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Labor figures – but not PM – slam ‘traitor’ Dan Andrews’ China propaganda appearance

BEN PACKHAM and NOAH YIM - September 03, 2025

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Daniel Andrews has ignited fury inside Labor for his decision to rub shoulders with the world’s most notorious dictators, but Anthony Albanese has refused to criticise his former Canberra flatmate for attending Xi Jinping’s military parade.

One federal Labor MP branded the former Victorian premier a “traitor” after he was greeted with a handshake by the Chinese President and placed just three rows behind North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un on a VIP podium to watch China’s ostentatious display of military might.

Prominent Labor figures, including former Queensland premier Annastacia Palaszczuk and former Victorian federal MP Michael Danby, slammed Mr Andrews for taking part in the spectacle, also attended by Russia’s Vladimir Putin and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian.

Mr Andrews, who has a Chinese-focused business with a Mandarin-speaking former adviser, did not consult the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade on his decision to attend the parade, while the Prime Minister was unaware he would do so, sources said.

Former foreign minister Bob Carr was also set to attend the parade commemorating the 80th anniversary of Japan’s surrender in World War II but pulled out at the last minute.

Australia’s ambassador to Beijing, Scott Dewar, snubbed the parade, leaving a mid-ranking diplomat and Australia’s military attache in Beijing to represent the government.

Mr Albanese was asked multiple times in parliament whether he condemned Mr Andrews’ attendance at the event but he sidestepped the questions, pointing to the Abbott government’s decision to send its veterans’ affairs minister, Michael Ronaldson, to the same event 10 years ago.

“I am responsible for the Australian government,” Mr Albanese said. “The Australian government did have a representative there and the Australian government did have a representative 10 years ago that was a minister … our government chose that would not be the case.”

Mr Albanese, who shared a flat with Mr Andrews in Canberra in the 1990s, made a record-length visit to China just six weeks ago, where he had a lengthy meeting with Mr Xi and was treated to a lavish private banquet by his host.

He said he engaged “across the board” with his international counterparts, and despite failing so far to secure a meeting with US President Donald Trump, re­iterated the US was Australia’s “most important partner”.

One Victorian-based federal Labor MP said Mr Andrews was “a traitor” for standing on the podium with murderous dictators. “I am gobsmacked,” the MP said. “He’s up there with Kim Jong-un and Vladimir Putin. It doesn’t help the Labor movement.”

Ms Palaszczuk said Mr Andrews’ attendance was a “bridge too far” and sent “mixed messages” to Australians.

“Go there for a holiday, do your business talks, but there’s no need to attend this military parade,” the former premier told Sky News.

“Trade is one thing, and tourism, but military parades? I would honestly stop and think seriously about that.”

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Mr Danby, a former chair of parliament’s foreign affairs and defence committee, said the image of the former Victorian premier shaking the hand of Mr Xi was an embarrassment to all Australians.

“It’s disgusting. These two (Mr Andrews and Mr Carr) – never a word for the poor Uighur Muslim people, and never a word for the poor Tibetans.

“I quote from Shakespeare: ‘Shame, shame, eternal shame’. How can (we) get away from that photograph? Never, you never get away from something like that.”

Opposition defence spokesman Angus Taylor blasted Mr Albanese for his failure to call out his longtime friend. “This was clearly a propaganda exercise to show off the unprecedented military build-up being driven by the Chinese Communist Party,” he said.

“If a senior Labor figure thinks it’s appropriate to participate in that then there are a lot of questions that need to be answered and frankly, it’s an appalling lack of leadership that the Prime Minister wasn’t prepared to condemn that.”

Little is known about Mr Andrews’ business interests in China but he has two companies with former China adviser Zheng Mei, who is also known as Marty Mei. As premier, he signed Victoria up to Mr Xi’s Belt and Road Initiative aimed at influencing governments across the world, spruiking the agreement as “confirmation of Victoria leading Australia in engagement with China”. It was subsequently quashed by then prime minister Scott Morrison.

Mr Zheng, who played a key role in the controversial BRI deal, accompanied Mr Andrews on as many as six official China visits.

Mr Andrews said in an official report following one of his China trips that the mission was aimed at promoting closer education, trade, and tourism ties.

“My travel aligns with government priorities to promote Victoria’s interests and capabilities with the state’s largest trading partner, and largest pre-pandemic source of international visitors and international students, noting Victoria’s sister states of Jiangsu and Sichuan Provinces are home to more than 160 million people,” Mr Andrews said.

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/politics/labor-figures-not-pm-slam-dan-andrews-china-propaganda-appearance/news-story/670376bf642307d1ea87d9a7b1ec185e

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Daniel Andrews defends China visit as deputy premier rebukes him for photo with dictators

Kieran Rooney and Paul Sakkal - September 4, 2025

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Deputy Premier Ben Carroll has publicly rebuked his former boss, Daniel Andrews, for posing in a photograph alongside dictators and alleged war criminals, saying it wasn’t worth it to further his personal business interests.

Carroll’s comments emerged as Andrews publicly responded to his appearance for the first time, saying the event was a chance to meet with regional leaders, and defended his stance on geopolitical issues such as the war in Ukraine.

Andrews said in a statement on Thursday afternoon that attending the Chinese military parade to celebrate 80 years since the end of World War II “was a chance to meet and engage with regional leaders – like former New Zealand prime ministers John Key and Helen Clark, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim and, of course, Chinese President Xi. We also shared in an official photograph.”

The official photograph features Andrews standing alongside some of the world’s most reviled political leaders, including the leaders of Russia, North Korea and Iran. Australia last week expelled the Iranian ambassador after announcing Iran had orchestrated the firebombing of the Adass Israel synagogue in Melbourne and a deli in Sydney. Russian President Vladimir Putin is being pursued by the International Criminal Court for allegations of war crimes, and the United Nations has said North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un could be guilty of crimes against humanity.

Carroll’s comments contrast with Premier Jacinta Allan’s response to the image. Allan, while not commenting directly on the pictures, said it was a good thing for Victoria that Andrews was well liked in China.

But the deputy premier, when approached by the media outside Treasury Place on Thursday, questioned Andrews’ judgment in appearing at the event.

“Most Victorians will be asking: Is it worth it for self-interested business purposes to be having a photo standing behind Kim Jong-un and Vladimir Putin?” Carroll said.

“I think for the vast majority, myself included, the value judgment [is] it’s not worth that photo, and that’ll be the question that Victorians want answers on.

“It’s not something I would have done.”

In his statement, Andrews defended his decision to attend the Chinese military parade, which was also a display of Chinese military might.

“I’ve said for years that a constructive relationship with China – our largest trading partner – is in Australia’s national interest, and hundreds of thousands of Australian jobs depend on it. That hasn’t changed,” he said.

“And just so there’s no confusion: I have condemned Putin and his illegal war in Ukraine from day one. That’s why he banned me from Russia last year.

“Further, my support of Israel and Australia’s Jewish community has been outspoken and unwavering, and I unequivocally condemn Iran for its attacks on Australia, Israel and elsewhere around the world,” Andrews said.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese also distanced himself from Andrews’ decision to attend the military parade, saying neither he nor any of his ministers would have considered going.

“My position is very, very clear, which is we did not send any government representative because it would not have been appropriate,” Albanese said during question time in federal parliament.

“None of my people would have sat in that position, as simple as that. It certainly is not something that I would have even thought of doing and no one in my government would have thought of doing.

“What individuals do very separate from the government is a matter for them.”

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Andrews and Carroll previously locked horns in the week of the former premier’s retirement in 2023. Carroll led his Labor Right faction to challenge for the leadership after Andrews and his Left grouping had thrown their support behind Allan, with Tim Pallas as her deputy.

This led to a heated party room meeting, which was ultimately resolved with Allan elected as leader and Carroll in the deputy position.

Since retiring from politics, Andrews has set up multiple corporate entities, named Wedgetail Partners, Glencairn Street Pty Ltd and Forty Eight & Partners. Some of his post-politics work has been to assist Chinese businesses looking to invest in Australia.

Carroll said it should be remembered that Putin, with help from Jong-un, was currently waging war against Ukraine and that Foreign Minister Penny Wong had in the past 24 hours sanctioned 14 Russian elites for enabling the war and silencing political expression.

He also referenced the 38 Australians who had lost their lives in the downing of flight MH17, for which Europe’s top court this year ruled Russia was responsible.

“They represent everything we stand against, and we should never stand with them. Always stand against them,” Carroll said.

In a statement on Wednesday night, Allan did not address the other attendees of the event but said it was good for Victoria that “Daniel Andrews is held in such high regard by the people of China”.

“Victoria is an old friend of China, and these connections are so valuable for our state,” she said.

“I’m looking forward to building on this connection by leading a trade mission to China this month, where I’ll meet with business, government, educators, and communities and launch Victoria’s new China strategy.”

Victorian Opposition Leader Brad Battin said Andrews needed to think about who he was standing with and the impact the photos had on local communities.

“He stands with the president of Iran, and we already know there are reports about [Iranian] involvement with the synagogue fires here, and the pressures on the Australian Jewish community,” he said.

“This is a responsibility for Daniel Andrews to now come and explain why he has decided to stand with those people.”

A spokesperson for the Australian Ukrainian Congress urged Andrews to apologise, calling his appearance an “appalling lack of judgment”.

“There are 11,500 Ukrainian refugees in Australia seeking shelter and protection from Putin’s war crimes, most of whom (5500) are currently in Victoria,” they said.

“These people deserve better than this distressing appearance by a senior Australian and Victoria leader.

“We ask Mr Andrews to reflect on his terrible lack of judgment and ask him for a clear expression of regret for the serious distress he has caused to Australian Ukrainians and the many Ukrainian refugees here.”

Victorian Transport Minister Gabrielle Williams said Andrews had ultimately appeared in a personal capacity but it was not an event she would attend.

“I’m unlikely to ever be invited to such an event, let alone attend one,” she said.

“That is ultimately a matter for him – he’s attended as a private citizen.

“I’m not here to speak for Dan Andrews today … that particular event is not likely one I would ever be invited to, nor would I attend.”

https://www.theage.com.au/politics/victoria/not-worth-that-photo-deputy-premier-rebukes-andrews-over-photo-with-putin-and-kim-jong-un-20250904-p5msg7.html

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‘Filling his pockets’: Resurfaced footage shows former Victorian premier Daniel Andrews praising China ahead of ‘parade of dictators’

Newly resurfaced footage of former Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews has shown him cosying up to the Chinese Communist Party before he attended the “parade of dictators”.

Oscar Godsell - September 4, 2025

Newly resurfaced footage of former Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews has shown him lavishing praise on the Chinese Communist Party ahead of the parade of dictators.

Mr Andrews had sat down for an interview with state-run media just weeks before his attendance at Chinese President Xi Jinping’s military parade.

The former Premier has long faced criticism over his ties with China and secret dealings with the CCP, including Victoria’s short-lived involvement with the Belt and Road Initiative in 2018.

Recent footage, recorded in March 2025, featured Mr Andrews speaking with CGTN, the state-run Chinese news outlet under CCP control.

Mr Andrews praised China in the interview for its focus on productivity and economic growth.

“It's really important to see President Xi, as well as other senior leaders across China so consistently speak about changing the way economic growth occurs,” he said.

“I'm really looking forward to hearing more about how the Chinese government … sees (the renewable energy transition) unfolding in the years to come.”

Mr Andrews described renewable energy as “absolutely the future” and said he does not think China “gets the international credit and acclaim” that he believes it deserves.

He made the remarks despite the fact that between 2014 and 2024, China’s energy emissions rose by 1,970 million tonnes.

The footage was released shortly before Mr Andrews’ high-profile attendance at China’s largest-ever military parade.

The former Premier then was photographed smiling alongside Chinese President Xi Jinping, Russian President Vladimir Putin, and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

Former press secretary to the Morrison government Andrew Carswell told Sky News that Mr Andrews' presence in China was a “colossal error of judgement”.

“This is what we've always thought about Dan. We’ve had suspicion that he is self-interested in this area,” Mr Carswell said.

“I wouldn't say he's an ideologue. I wouldn't say he is seeking alignment with the Chinese Communist Party, but he's an opportunist.

“He's going to take that photo to every single meeting that he has in China and Asia more broadly … to drive business. So this is all about filling his pockets.”

The military parade on Wednesday marked the 80th anniversary of Japan’s defeat in World War II and was billed by Beijing as a demonstration of China’s global leadership.

The parade showcased more than 10,000 troops, hypersonic missiles, and an intercontinental ballistic missile launcher capable of hitting Australia.

Prime Minister Albanese declined to condemn his close friend, insisting that Mr Andrews was not acting on behalf of the government.

https://www.skynews.com.au/australia-news/politics/filling-his-pockets-resurfaced-footage-shows-former-victorian-premier-daniel-andrews-praising-china-ahead-of-parade-of-dictators/news-story/797965921fd9868ead3b7ae64def0785

https://x.com/GlobalWatchCGTN/status/1903688159973855678

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Former premier of Victoria, Australia: China's renewable energy drive deserves greater global recognition

CGTN - 22-Mar-2025

Ahead of the 2025 China Development Forum, Daniel Andrews, former premier of Victoria, Australia, sat down with CGTN's Cui Yingjie in Beijing for an exclusive interview, sharing his insights on China's high-quality development and its role in the global green transition. As a reformer who spearheaded Victoria's shift away from fossil fuels, he said, "Formal Australia-China cooperation on decarbonizing heavy industries and advancing wind and solar technologies must be our next priority—this isn't just about our nations' futures, but the health of the planet." He praised China's new quality productive forces as a transformative model, stressing that China's progress in renewable energy deserves far greater global recognition. He also pointed out that while the United States remains obsessed with "erratic and nonsensical tariff games," Australia and China are forging a new path toward global sustainability through pragmatic collaboration.

https://news.cgtn.com/news/2025-03-22/Ex-Victoria-premier-China-s-renewable-energy-efforts-deserve-praise-1BWGLoH3UNG/p.html

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Anthony Albanese talks critical minerals in ‘warm’ chat with Trump ahead of US visit

JOE KELLY and GEOFF CHAMBERS - 5 September 2025

Anthony Albanese has spoken with Donald Trump for the fourth time since the US President was re-elected last November, with the two leaders discussing economic co-operation, trade and critical minerals at a key time for the alliance relationship.

The phone call will boost hopes of a much anticipated meeting between both leaders, with Mr Albanese set to travel shortly to New York where he will address the UN General Assembly and officially recognise the State of Palestine – a point of policy conflict with Washington.

Posting on social media, the Australian Prime Minister said that he had “another warm and constructive conversation with President @realDonaldTrump. We discussed our trade and economic relationship as well as areas for growth including critical minerals.”

“We also discussed shared US-Australia security interests,” he said.

An Australian read-out of the conversation said that both men discussed the “strength of our relationship and the importance of our shared security interests.”

However, there was no mention of the landmark AUKUS agreement under which the US has agreed to provide Australia with at least three Virginia-class submarines from the early 2030s.

The trilateral AUKUS agreement between the US, UK and Australia is currently being reviewed by the Pentagon – heightening fears that the Trump administration could seek to modify the deal.

Mr Albanese has not yet met face-to-face with the US President, but is travelling to New York later this month to address the UN General Assembly in what could present another opportunity for an in person encounter between the two leaders.

The Australian Prime Minister has previously said that he is available for a meeting with Mr Trump at “very short notice, at any time” and that Australia would continue to engage with the US.

Speaking in August, Mr Albanese said the US President had given him a “very warm phone conversation after my re-election as Prime Minister, and made some public comments about what he thought, that was very generous, and I thank him for it.”

Australia’s alliance relationship with the US faces a period of uncertainty. In addition to the Pentagon’s review of the AUKUS agreement, Canberra has rejected consistent American demands for defence spending to be lifted to 3.5 per cent of GDP and the Albanese government has criticised the imposition by Washington of a baseline ten per cent tariff on Australia.

Previous attempts for Mr Albanese to meet with the US President have fallen through including at June’s G7 summit in Canada, where Mr Trump left early to return to Washington to oversee the American response to the unfolding crisis in the Middle East – with the President eventually ordering the prevision bombing of Iran’s nuclear enrichment sites.

The pair first spoke shortly after Mr Trump’s November 2024 election win, with Mr Albanese saying at the time that he had personally congratulated the US President on his victory.

“We talked about the importance of the Alliance, and the strength of the Australia-US relationship in security, AUKUS, trade and investment,” Mr Albanese said. “I look forward to working together in the interests of both our countries.”

They spoke for a second time in February for 40 minutes ahead of the introduction of Mr Trump’s sweeping reciprocal tariffs in April, with Mr Albanese describing their conversation as “warm” and “positive.”

The pair talked about AUKUS and the economic relationship, with Mr Trump later describing the Australian Prime Minister as a “very fine man.” He also said he would give “great consideration” to exempting Australia from his steel and aluminium tariffs – although this was an outcome that never came to pass.

In May, the leaders spoke again after Mr Albanese’s election victory. AUKUS and tariffs were, once again, two of the issues discussed. “I had a warm and positive conversation with President Trump … and I thank him for his very warm message of congratulations,“ Mr Albanese said.

“We talked about how AUKUS and tariffs will continue to engage, we will engage with each other on a face-to-face basis at some time in the future. And I thank him for reaching out in such a positive way.”

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/anthony-albanese-talks-critical-minerals-in-warm-chat-with-trump-ahead-of-us-visit/news-story/c1bf895b9e53010ebfc3d29c7c58189d

https://x.com/AlboMP/status/1963602153945403858

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Albanese has announced a strategic reserve of critical minerals and Australia’s ambassador to the US, former prime minister Kevin Rudd, told a think tank last month that Australia could be a rare earths “superpower”.

Rudd welcomed the latest phone call between Trump and Albanese. “Lots going on in the US-Australia relationship. And going from strength to strength,” he posted on X.

The Coalition and some media commentators have criticised Albanese for failing to arrange an in-person meeting with Trump since his return to power in January, noting the US president has met with other allies including British Prime Minister Keir Starmer multiple times, and with counterparts from the Indo-Pacific including the leaders of Japan, India and, as of last week, South Korea.

They were due to meet at the G7 leaders’ summit in Canada in June, but Trump left the gathering early amid a brewing crisis in the Middle East.

Albanese and Trump are both due to attend the opening of the 80th session of the United Nations General Assembly in New York later this month, though no formal meeting has been announced, and it is expected Trump will only spend a short time at the event.

The UN summit will be coloured by the decision of a number of US allies, including Australia, to recognise Palestine as a sovereign state amid the war between Israel and militant group Hamas - a move opposed by Washington. There was no indication of whether Trump and Albanese discussed the decision on their call.

On Thursday night, Albanese also participated in a separate call of members of the so-called “coalition of the willing” on Ukraine, hosted by French President Emmanuel Macron, Starmer and Zelensky. Trump was dialled into that meeting, according to a White House official.

https://www.theage.com.au/world/north-america/albanese-trump-in-warm-and-constructive-call-ahead-of-potential-meeting-20250905-p5msku.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cgAfm0RFEFc

https://x.com/AmboRudd/status/1963638673158668520

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Former US, Australian defence heads reunite to urge Trump to stick with AUKUS

Michael Koziol - September 3, 2025

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New York: A high-level coalition of former ministers and military leaders is urging the Trump administration not to abandon the AUKUS pact with Australia and the United Kingdom, saying that while it will rob the US of nuclear-powered submarines at a crucial time, the benefits are worth the cost.

Jim Mattis, who served as Donald Trump’s defence secretary in his first term, co-wrote a piece published in the respected journal Foreign Affairs with former Australian defence minister Marise Payne, former British chief of defence staff Nicholas Carter and former US chief of naval operations Gary Roughead.

Published overnight, the essay warns that cancelling or substantially weakening AUKUS “would do the work of Washington’s adversaries for them”, noting both China and Russia do not like the alliance.

“The strongest argument for AUKUS is that China and Russia object to it,” the authors say. “When a country’s adversaries don’t like what it is doing, it should usually press on.”

Under the pact, the US is due to sell Australia between three and five Virginia-class submarines in the 2030s, before Australia and the UK build a new class of vessel together, for entry into service in the 2040s.

However, the US president of the day has the final say on whether those submarines are sold to Australia, and the Navy – including Trump’s pick for chief of naval operations Daryl Caudle, who was sworn in last week – has warned the deal cannot be fulfilled unless the US lifts production from 1.2 boats a year to 2.3.

In the essay, Mattis, Payne, Carter and Roughead argue AUKUS will eventually enrich the maritime industrial bases of all three countries – even if the US must give up some submarines at a time when it is not producing enough for its own needs.

“These costs are worth the benefits,” they write. “The three states will essentially be operating common submarines, which will ultimately provide industry with a longer runway and thus the necessary industrial predictability to increase production.”

The authors say AUKUS will deter China by placing more nuclear attack submarines in the Pacific, even if they lack nuclear warheads, as Australia’s will. It would also enable American and British submarines to patrol elsewhere as circumstances demanded, troubling Moscow.

Mattis, Payne and the others acknowledge problems with AUKUS, particularly the second pillar of the program under which members are supposed to co-operate on emerging defence technologies.

Such co-operation requires sharing data and technologies which are usually highly protected: the authors say this part of AUKUS is “operationally adrift”, and more must be done to break down those barriers.

They also contend that sticking with the deal is symbolically important at a time when the US’s credibility as a reliable ally and partner is being questioned around the world. “Washington should thus do more than just recommit to AUKUS. It should revitalise the pact for the decades ahead,” they write.

(continued)

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While the essay is unlikely to be read personally by Trump, who prefers television, it is certain to catch the attention of key decision-makers in the administration, including the undersecretary of defence for policy, Elbridge Colby, who is leading the Pentagon’s AUKUS review, and his deputy Alexander Velez-Green.

Colby has written for Foreign Affairs himself, arguing in a 2022 essay that the US should be doing much more to prepare for a potential war with China over Taiwan by redirecting military assets away from other spheres – such as Europe and the Middle East – to the Indo-Pacific.

That is now central to the Pentagon’s concerns about AUKUS, chiefly its desire for more information about if and how Australia would use the submarines in a conflict with China over Taiwan or other issues.

One of the strongest advocates of the deal in the US Congress, Democratic representative from Connecticut Joe Courtney, also authored an opinion piece on the weekend saying that abandoning or truncating the deal would “be met with great rejoicing in Beijing”.

Writing in National Interest magazine, Courtney said Colby should look past the current production tally of Virginia-class submarines because significant investments in the maritime industrial base were coming to fruition and would be paying dividends in the 2030s.

The essays underscore the substantial fears in the political and military establishments of all three AUKUS countries that Trump will back away from the Joe Biden-era deal.

They also come at a time of frayed relations after a mangled visit to Washington last week by Australian Deputy Prime Minister and Defence Minister Richard Marles.

While Marles met Vice President J.D. Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller, his encounter with US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth remains under a cloud of mystery.

After Australian officials released photographs of Marles and Hegseth, the Pentagon initially described it as a “happenstance encounter” rather than a proper meeting. But a spokesman later issued a statement saying the meeting was co-ordinated in advance. This masthead reported the encounter lasted about 10 minutes.

The Pentagon was contacted for comment on the Foreign Affairs essay. It has previously said its review of the AUKUS pact would be completed in the northern autumn, which could mean any time between now and Christmas.

https://www.theage.com.au/world/north-america/former-us-australian-defence-heads-reunite-to-urge-trump-to-stick-with-aukus-20250903-p5mrxt.html

—

Don’t Abandon AUKUS

The Case for Recommitting to — and Revitalizing — the Alliance

Gary Roughead, Marise Payne, Nicholas Carter and James Mattis - September 2, 2025

https://www.foreignaffairs.com/united-states/dont-abandon-aukus-jim-mattis

https://archive.is/20250902160752/https://www.foreignaffairs.com/united-states/dont-abandon-aukus-jim-mattis

https://qalerts.app/?q=Mattis

https://qresear.ch/?q=Mattis

https://qresear.ch/?q=Marise+Payne

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Access and influence: how ‘Statesman Dan’ is getting rich in China

DAMON JOHNSTON - September 04, 2025

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Former Victorian premier Daniel Andrews has spoken in statesmanlike terms in meetings with Chinese business leaders, promoting closer economic ties between China and Australia, inviting senior figures to visit Melbourne and indicating he will “spare no effort” to boost exchanges and co-operation with the communist superpower, according to published accounts of top-level talks held since he left office.

Just one day after sparking an international storm by after rubbing shoulders with some of the world’s most notorious dictators when he attended Xi Jinping’s military parade, details of Mr Andrews’ booming China-focused private business interests have emerged.

“This was all about access and influence; both add up to big dollars for Dan,” one source said of his controversial attendance at the event with the world’s harshest dictators.

As heat intensified in Australia over the ex-premier’s appearance, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese hardened his position when grilled in Question Time over the issue, but still avoided personally criticising his friend and former Labor premier.

“My position is very, very clear. Which is we did not send any government representative because it would not have been appropriate,” he said. “None of my people would have sat in that position, as simple as that.” Labor Premier Jacinta Allan stood by her predecessor, saying

Mr Andrews’ links to China were “good for Victoria” and “Victoria is an old friend of China and these connections are so valuable for our state”.

Two Chinese business think tanks – the China Institute for South China Sea Studies and the China Center for International Economic Exchanges – lauded Mr Andrews in official records of the meetings in March and October 2024, with one describing him as “former Victoria Governor Andrews of Australia”.

After meeting Mr Andrews and his former government senior China adviser and now private business partner, Marty Mei, in March last year, the CISCSS said they discussed “international exchanges” between Hainan Province and Victoria.

The tone and content of both official accounts of the 2024 business meetings suggest that Mr Andrews’ reputation in China as an influential Australian political leader remains one of his key selling points as he builds a thriving business empire.

“The two sides exchange views on international exchanges and co-operation between Hainan Province and Victoria State in the fields of think tank construction, education, culture, tourism, etc, as well as Hainan’s high-level opening up and the construction of a free trade port with Chinese characteristics,” the CISCSS’s account of the March meeting at the Boao Forum stated.

“(Daniel Andrews) expressed that he sincerely invited and welcomed (CISCSS) President Wang Sheng and his delegation to visit Melbourne,” the account states.

“As an old friend and good friend of the Chinese people, he will spare no effort to promote exchanges and co-operation between Hainan Province and Victoria in the fields of economy, trade, culture, education, tourism, etc, promote common development and achieve mutual benefit and win-win results.”

The Australian has approached Mr Andrews and Mr Mei for comment.

(continued)

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The China Institute for South China Sea Studies has been a strong advocate for China’s right to influence the South China Sea and defended its surveys and military patrols in the disputed region.

In October last year, according to an account published by the China Center for International Economic Exchanges, Mr Andrews and Mr Mei met with the Bi Jingquan, the chairman of the National Economic Centre.

“Daniel Andrews said that he looks forward to further promoting bilateral cultural exchanges between China and Australia, enhancing mutual understanding and trust between the two countries, and promoting pragmatic co-operation in the above mentioned key areas,” the CCIEE’s official record of the talks stated.

“Daniel Andrews expressed his expectation to further promote bilateral people-to-people exchanges between China and Australia, enhance mutual understanding and trust between the two countries, and promote practical co-operation in the abovementioned key areas.

“He also expressed his expectation to have in-depth exchanges with the centre on the research and formulation of relevant economic and trade policies, so as to promote the sustained and healthy development of China-Australia relations and achieve mutual benefit and win-win results.”

In a Chinese television interview in March this year, first reported on by The Australian on Thursday, the former premier also lauded Xi Jinping’s record on renewable energy changes and declared he was “honoured to be an old friend of the Chinese people”.

Mr Andrews and Mr Mei travelled to Beijing this week and the former Victorian premier walked Xi Jinping’s red carpet alongside Russian dictator Vladimir Putin and North Korean hard line ruler Kim Jong-un. Mr Andrews was filmed warmly shaking supreme communist leader’s hand and talking to him as he entered the ceremony in Tiananmen Square which displayed China’s military might.

The business partners have established Wedgetail Partners Pty Ltd – Mr Andrews owns 90 per cent and Mr Mei owns 10 per cent – since he quit as premier two years ago. Labor sources familiar with the Chinese-focused business say it is thriving.

The sources say Wedgetail operates as a “middle man” connecting Chinese and Australian business interests, and the ALP figures said the former premier’s controversial appearance will help promote his business globally.

Wedgetail Partners was originally based at 470 St Kilda Rd, which is also the headquarters for property billions Max Beck, who is a self-professed friend of the former premier. But Australian Securities & Investments Commission documents confirm that on July 28, Wedgetail’s business address was changed to the Andrews family home in Mulgrave, in Melbourne southeast. Company records confirm Mr Andrews’ 90 per cent stake in Wedgetail is held by a company called Glencairn Street which he is the sole director and shareholder of.

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/politics/access-and-influence-how-statesman-dan-is-getting-rich-in-china/news-story/90c84c33a7252574ce02d82adb6736bd

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/commentary/comrade-dan-sends-ccp-the-wrong-message/news-story/89e670edfc33f563957a717a956de971

https://x.com/DanielAndrewsMP/status/646090251446845440

https://x.com/danielandrewsmp/status/646957321919180801

https://x.com/DanielAndrewsMP/status/647582104738369537

https://qresear.ch/?q=Marty+Mei

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‘Deeply honoured’ Daniel Andrews spruiks Xi’s parade in People’s Daily

WILL GLASGOW and BEN PACKHAM - September 04, 2025

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Beijing’s propaganda machine has quoted fawning former Victorian premier Daniel Andrews in the Communist Party’s flagship daily as being “deeply honoured” to attend President Xi Jinping’s gargantuan military parade.

Anthony Albanese distanced himself on Thursday from Mr Andrews’ decision to join a historic gathering of dictators while even senior figures in the China-focused business community condemned the ex-premier’s “bizarre” behaviour.

The Australian was unable to contact Mr Andrews, who is believed still to be in Beijing in meetings related to his China-focused consultancy, which has Andrew Forrest’s iron ore giant Fortescue as an anchor client.

In an unapologetic statement released on Thursday afternoon, Mr Andrews defended his outing with Mr Xi and the Chinese leader’s guests of honour, the Russian and North Korean dictators, Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong-un, at an event Beijing used to assert its increasingly lethal military capabilities.

“I’ve said for years that a constructive relationship with China, our largest trading partner, is in Australia’s national interest and hundreds of thousands of Australian jobs depend on it – that hasn't changed,” Mr Andrews said in his first comments since Beijing announced he would attend the PLA parade to mark China’s victory over Japan in World War II.

The historic gathering of Mr Xi, Putin and Kim on Wednesday – a message of defiance directed at Washington and the US-alliance system — marked the first time the leaders of China, Russia and North Korea had been in the same place since the 1950s.

Mr Andrews’ attendance continued a long pattern of splitting with Canberra on China policy, including his decision to sign Victoria up for Mr Xi’s Belt and Road Initiative in 2018.

The Prime Minister on Thursday refused for a second day to condemn his former flatmate’s decision to attend the event, but told parliament: “None of my people would have sat in that position. I am not responsible for what every Australian citizen does. What I’m responsible for … is what our government does.

“My position is very, very clear, which is — we did not send any government representative because it would not have been appropriate. It certainly is not something that I would have even thought of doing and no-one in my government would have thought of doing. Simple as that.”

Mr Andrews said in his statement that his trip to China had allowed him to “meet and engage” with former New Zealand prime ministers John Key and Helen Clark, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim “and of course Chinese President Xi”.

“We also shared an official photograph,” Mr Andrews said of his moment on Beijing’s red carpet with Xi.

In his statement, Mr Andrews also attempted to brandish his anti-authoritarian credentials.

“And just so there’s no confusion – I have condemned Putin and his illegal war in Ukraine from day one. That’s why he banned me from Russia last year,” he said.

“Further, my support for Israel and Australia’s Jewish community has been outspoken and unwavering, and I unequivocally condemn Iran for its attacks on Australia, Israel and elsewhere in the world.”

While Mr Andrews continued to avoid Australian media interviews, he appeared to be more talkative to Beijing’s official mouthpieces.

Mr Andrews was one of a gaggle of former politicians featured in the parade day edition of the People’s Daily, Beijing’s flagship masthead. The Australian was unable to reach Mr Andrews to confirm the accuracy of the quotes attributed to him.

“I am deeply honoured to be invited by China to attend this solemn commemoration,” Mr Andrews was quoted as saying in a piece on page 6 of Wednesday’s paper with the headline: “China is a key force in maintaining world peace, stability and development”.

Mr Andrews was quoted as saying most Australians were ignorant of China’s history in World War II, which he said had “global significance”.

“In Australia, many people do not know the history of the Chinese People’s war of resistance against Japanese aggression,” Andrews was quoted as saying.

“There is no doubt that the victory of the Chinese People’s war of resistance against Japanese aggression had a significant impact on turning the tide in the Asian theatre of World War II. This history has broader regional and even global significance.

“The victory of the Chinese People’s war of resistance against Japanese aggression safeguarded world peace and justice.”

(continued)

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Victorian Premier Jacinta Allan, who in coming weeks will lead a huge delegation for a four-city trip to China, defended her predecessor on parochial grounds.

“It is good for Victoria that Daniel Andrews is held in such high regard by the people of China,” she said. “Victoria is an old friend of China and these connections are so valuable for our state.”

Australian Sinologist Geremie Barme was withering of Mr Andrews’ decision, along with his fellow parade attendees and “has-beens” Ms Clark and Mr Key.

“The very presence of such thirsty opportunists in Beijing lends support, although not perhaps lustre, to ‘the China story historical-academic-PR complex’ which the Communist Party promotes worldwide,” Mr Barme said.

“What should we call this clutch of ‘former people’? Maybe ‘useless idiots’ will do.”

Even some senior figures in Australia’s China-focused business community were appalled by Mr Andrews’ presence at the parade, as the Victorian tries to grow the secretive consultancy he founded with his former political staffer Zheng “Marty” Mei.

“It’s bizarre,” one senior business figure said, adding it had undercut the federal government’s attempt to lead “a grown-up conversation about China”.

“I imagine Albanese is spitting chips about this,” the business figure added.

Some Australian China-focused business advisers predicted Mr Andrews would be able to put the picture with Mr Xi to work for years with Chinese businesses.

“The fact he walked the red carpet and shook Xi’s hand, that’s huge,” said a China-based corporate adviser.

Another corporate figure – who also insisted on speaking anonymously because of the political sensitivity – was sceptical about Mr Andrews’ business prospects. “A well-informed Chinese company would want to think seriously about how they engage with him,” the figure said.

Former foreign minister Bob Carr, who on Thursday spoke at a closed-door function with a Beijing think-tank after skipping the military spectacle, said he had “made it clear” to Chinese diplomats in Australia that he would not attend the parade when he accepted an invitation to China’s end-of-WWII celebrations.

Mr Carr declined to comment on Mr Andrews’ decision. “He is someone who has been battered to death by media hostility in his own state, and gone on to win, win big majorities,” he said. “He can defend himself.”

Mr Andrews is not registered under the federal government’s Foreign Influence Transparency Scheme as working on behalf of a “foreign principal”.

It is unclear whether his China-focused business activities would require him to register, but the opposition quizzed Mr Albanese on the subject in question time on Thursday.

The Prime Minister replied: “Everyone should comply with the law. It’s as simple as that.”

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/deeply-honoured-daniel-andrews-appears-in-peoples-daily/news-story/3360fb36e4bd6d43bf4b160947e040b0

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China praises Daniel Andrews for defending ‘peace and justice’ but accuses Australia of ‘undermining stability’

WILL GLASGOW - 5 September 2025

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Beijing has applauded former Victorian premier Daniel ­Andrews for joining the Chinese government in defending “peace and ­justice,” as the People’s Liberation Army accused Australia and its ­allies of “undermining regional peace and stability” by conducting a joint freedom-of-navigation ­exercise on the day of President Xi Jinping’s vast military parade.

China’s Foreign Ministry on Friday night suggested Mr Andrews and other “leaders, former statesman, high-level officials, ­envoys and friends” were examples for the Albanese government and others in the international community to follow, after the former premier appeared on Mr Xi’s red carpet at the parade, and ­attended a medal ceremony for family members of foreign soldiers who fought alongside China in World War II.

Asked by The Australian about the controversy surrounding Mr Andrews’ attendance at the ­parade, Foreign Ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun said those who joined Mr Xi, Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un were showing their commitment to “defending historical memory” and “peace and justice”.

“China stands ready to work with all peace-loving countries and people to have a correct ­perception of history, jointly ­defend the fruits of World War II and the post-war international order and safeguard peace and ­stability,” Mr Guo said.

The comments came after ­Beijing’s propaganda machine continued to feature Mr Andrews. News agency Xinhua reported on his attendance at the medal ­ceremony, where he was near the centre, in the front row of the ­family picture of the event run by the Chinese People’s Association for Friendship with Foreign ­Countries.

People familiar with Mr Andrews’ China-focused consultancy have said he hoped this week’s photos, above all his picture with China’s President on a red carpet in Tiananmen Square, will help ­attract more Chinese business clients.

While Mr Andrews was being praised in China, ALP president Wayne Swan joined the chorus of critics of the former premier’s decision to attend the military parade, defying Canberra’s efforts to demote Australian representation. Anthony Albanese’s ­decision to lower official representation below ambassador level was accompanied by a joint maritime operation that enraged Beijing.

An Australian navy vessel joined counterparts from Canada, the Philippines and the US for the exercise, which began on Tuesday and continued on Wednesday, as Mr Xi brought together his historic assembly in Tiananmen Square to admire the PLA’s increasingly lethal capabilities. In a statement, Australia’s defence department said the exercise was conducted within the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone.

“The Maritime Cooperative Activity was conducted from 2 to 3 September 2025, with the Royal Australian Navy’s guided-missile destroyer HMAS Brisbane participating alongside the Philippine Navy’s frigate BRP Jose Rizal and the Royal Canadian Navy’s frigate HMCS Ville de Quebec,” the department said.

“P-8A Poseidon maritime ­patrol aircraft from the Royal Australian Air Force and the United States Navy also supported the activity.

“This MCA demonstrates the collective commitment of Australia and its partners to upholding the right to freedom of navigation and overflight, other lawful uses of the sea and international airspace, as well as respect for maritime rights under international law, as reflected in the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea.”

A PLA spokesman denounced the exercise.

“The Philippines is soliciting foreign countries to conduct so-called joint patrols, undermining regional peace and stability,” said a spokesperson for the PLA’s Southern Theatre Command.

Senior Colonel Tian Junli added: “The theatre command’s troops remain on high alert at all times and resolutely defend China’s territorial sovereignty and maritime rights and interests. Any attempt to disrupt the situation in the South China Sea or create hotspots will not succeed.”

He noted that China’s navy had responded with its own “routine patrol”.

China’s official mouthpieces bristled at the “noteworthy” timing of this “latest provocation” by Australia, Canada, the Philippines and the US.

“This makes the ­Marcos government’s move extremely egregious as the Philippines also suffered from Japanese aggression,” the state owned China Daily said in an editorial in its Friday edition.

(continued)

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Asked by The Australian about the Albanese government’s decision to send a low-ranking official below ambassador level to the parade, Beijing urged Australia and other countries to adopt a “right perception” of history.

“In World War II, Chinese and Australian people upheld justice and fought together,” Mr Guo said. “China is ready to work with all peace-loving countries and people to consolidate the right perception of history and uphold the outcomes and international order after World War II to safeguard world peace and stability.”

On Friday, Foreign Minister Penny Wong and Defence Minister Richard Marles met their Japanese counterparts in Tokyo, Australia’s most important strategic partner in Asia. The Japanese government has been particularly concerned about Beijing’s elevation of China’s war-time history.

Senator Wong on Friday said shared “values and trust” in each other underpinned Australia’s relationship with Japan.

”We do face very difficult, challenging strategic circumstances,” she said after closed-door discussions, much of them centred on China but also swapping notes on their shared vital ally, President Donald Trump’s erratic America.

China’s military and paramilitary-like coast guard have been increasingly aggressive in recent years as Beijing asserts what it maintains are territorial rights to almost the entire South China Sea and in contested waters in the East China Sea.

In 2016, the Turnbull government enraged Beijing by publicly supporting a ruling by a tribunal arbitrating the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea.

The Chinese government has never accepted the decision by the international court, dismissing it as “nothing but a piece of waste paper”.

Canberra has maintained its support of the tribunal’s decision throughout the Morrison and Albanese governments and reaffirmed its support again on Thursday to the “final and legally binding” Judgement.

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/world/china-accuses-australia-allies-of-undermining-regional-peace/news-story/644b6e0e618ec51592ae0c3c471314b4

https://www.cpaffc.org.cn/index/news/detail/id/10417/lang/1.html

https://www.fmprc.gov.cn/mfa_eng/xw/fyrbt/202509/t20250905_11703299.html

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Penny Wong cautions Daniel Andrews on China visit after meetings in Japan

Stephen Dziedzic and James Oaten - 5 September 2025

Foreign Minister Penny Wong has cautioned former Victorian premier Daniel Andrews to be "mindful" about the message he sent by attending a huge military parade in Beijing earlier this week.

The Coalition has furiously criticised Mr Andrews for joining several authoritarian leaders — including Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un — at the massive spectacle held on Wednesday to mark the defeat of Japan in World War II.

It has also pressed Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to condemn Mr Andrews, saying he assisted China's efforts to give the spectacle international legitimacy.

When asked about the matter, Senator Wong did not directly criticise the former premier, but said all Australians needed to be "mindful" about the signals they sent by attending events.

"Obviously I speak for Australia and the Australian government, I don't speak for private individuals," she said.

"But I think, I hope, that we all should be mindful of the message that our presence and engagement sends.

"I certainly am."

She also emphasised that Australia decided not to send any politicians or even its ambassador to attend the parade — in contrast to the last anniversary parade in 2015, when a Coalition government minister attended.

"I would emphasise that Australia made a decision to be represented at the embassy staff level," Senator Wong said.

The foreign minister made the remarks alongside Defence Minister Richard Marles in Tokyo, after attending the annual 2 + 2 meeting with their Japanese counterparts.

Australia to 'modernise' defence force after 'significant' show from China

Both Australia and Japan have been deeply unnerved by China's massive military build-up and monitored this week's parade very closely

Mr Marles called it a "very significant display of Chinese military capability".

He also said there was now a "greater degree of cooperation between China and Russia and North Korea" which he said was "an expression of the complex strategic landscape which we've now been articulating since we came to government".

He said Australia was responding by building closer ties with partners like Japan and racing to "modernise and build our defence force".

"Where that leads us is clearly seeing that our interest lies in ensuring that we are firstly asserting the rules-based order, and secondly, making our contribution to the peace and stability of the region in which we live," he said.

The high-level meeting comes just a month after Australia announced it would spend $10 billion on buying Japanese-made Mogami-class frigates.

It is the biggest defence deal for Japan, which has only ever exported defence equipment, rather than platforms like tanks, fighter jets, and warships.

Mr Marles said the contract to buy the warships would be finalised early next year.

"There is a real intent on both sides to see those negotiations move forward quickly," he said.

The first three Mogami frigates will be built in Japan to ensure quick delivery, while the remaining eight will be made in Australia.

Mr Marles stressed the Mogami frigate was selected primarily due to its suitability for the Australian navy, but added it would further deepen the strategic partnership between Australia and Japan.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-09-05/penny-wong-comments-on-dan-andrews-in-japan-tokyo-visit/105741584

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Chinese embassy officials observe Canberra spy case in court

LIAM MENDES - September 01, 2025

A woman accused of spying on behalf of the Chinese Communist Party in the heart of Canberra has invoked Bruce Lehrmann’s aborted criminal trial to keep her identity a secret, as members of the Chinese embassy quietly attended a hearing to watch her in court.

The woman, who cannot be named because of a suppression order, on Monday indicated she would plead not guilty to working as a “proxy” to covertly gather ­information for an official working for China’s security bureau about Canberra’s Guan Yin Citta Buddhist Association.

The ACT Magistrates Court heard prosecutors had seized nine devices – amassing a total of 2.5tb of data – which has to be analysed and translated.

An application to extend the suppression order in place since not long after her arrest in August was granted by ACT Chief Magistrate Lorraine Walker on the grounds that a juror could conduct research about the accused.

The woman has been charged with one count of reckless foreign interference after allegedly feeding information to China’s Public Security Bureau about the Canberra Guan Yin Citta Buddhist Association, a group banned in China.

If found guilty, she faces a maximum 15 years’ jail. She appeared emotionless on Monday after being quietly led into the courtroom.

The permanent Australian resident is accused of receiving more than $230,000 while taking instructions from a mysterious security official over encrypted messaging platform WeChat.

Her barrister, Anthony Williamson, said she would be pleading not guilty. In applying for the suppression to be continued, he referred to the 2022 criminal rape trial of Mr Lehrmann, which was aborted from juror misconduct and saw his charges dropped.

The application for the extension of the suppression order was heard in a secret room listed under a pseudonym in court, attended only by legal representatives from the AFP, Commonwealth Department of Public Prosecutions, Nationwide News (publisher of this masthead), her own legal representatives and supporters as well as members of the media.

Sitting inconspicuously in the courtroom, however, were two mysterious individuals, who refused to answer questions upon leaving and drove away in a Diplomatic Corps-plated vehicle, with a number-plate prefix corresponding to the Chinese embassy.

The court was closed for some 15 minutes for her defence to put part of the application for continued suppression order to the magistrate. In continuing the suppression order, Chief Magistrate Walker noted the “high profile” nature of the matter and that there was “highly prejudicial” information in the public domain about the defendant.

“It is a matter which by its very nature is likely to pique a certain curiosity in the level of apprehension in relation to anyone who may be a juror in these proceedings, which ultimately must be heard in the Supreme Court before a jury,” she said.

“I perceive a very real likelihood of prejudice to this defendant at this point in time, if her name is made public, and jurors are potentially influenced.”

Chief Magistrate Walker also noted it was only the third time an individual had been charged under the legislation and the first time in the jurisdiction.

Officers executing a search warrant on the woman’s home at the end of June located hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of ­luxury goods, including a Rolex watch receipt, large boxes of high-end handbags “that were too numerous to practicably count” and a receipt for a mystery item costing $400,000.

Court documents show the woman travelled to China on “several occasions in the past ­several years” including to the ­region where her alleged security handler was employed.

She is alleged to have received “taskings” from the handler attached to the Jindong Branch – 650km east of Wuhan – from June 2, 2022, to ­covertly collect ­information and infiltrate the ­association.

Police believe the woman, who first entered Australia on a higher education visa, secretly collected information about the Guan Yin Citta organisation, including ­details regarding the residential addresses of former leaders of the group and their national office ­locations.

She allegedly provided photos of the front doors of businesses, internal map data of locations and financial information about organisations and businesses, as well as gathering information about a radio station and its affiliations with the Buddhist group.

The matter will return to court on November 10.

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/chinese-embassy-officials-observe-canberra-spy-case-in-court/news-story/0f6021f02dc27e91ea1c51c2764fa654

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High Court throws out Ben Roberts-Smith’s defamation appeal bid

Michaela Whitbourn - September 4, 2025

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The High Court has thrown out Ben Roberts-Smith’s last-ditch bid to appeal against his damning defamation loss, putting an end to seven years of litigation costing tens of millions of dollars.

On Thursday, the nation’s highest court refused the former Special Air Service corporal’s application for special leave to appeal against a decision of the Full Court of the Federal Court, which had rejected his bid to overturn a decision that found he had committed war crimes.

Roberts-Smith, a Victoria Cross recipient, launched the defamation case against The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald in 2018, alleging the newspapers defamed him in a series of articles that year suggesting he was a war criminal.

The High Court said the application raised “no question of legal principle” and the proposed appeal had “insufficient prospects of success”.

Investigative journalists Nick McKenzie and Chris Masters, the lead authors of the articles, said in a joint statement that the case had been an “ordeal that all the nation has endured”.

“We are grateful to the courts for their sound and thorough deliberations, and to the Australian soldiers who had the moral courage to stand up for what was right and tell the truth about Ben Roberts-Smith.

“They are the heroes of this grim but vital story that the Australian public needs to know. We also remember the Afghan victims of war crimes whose families are still waiting for justice.”

Tory Maguire, Nine’s managing director of publishing, said the decision vindicated “the brave soldiers of Australia’s SAS Regiment who spoke the truth in telling their stories at great personal risk”.

“This is a win for them and the values they represent. While this case has been challenging at times for all of those who spoke up, for the journalists Nick McKenzie and Chris Masters, and their newsroom leaders, it was important for Nine to defend public interest journalism,” Maguire said.

“With no further legal options available on this matter, the closure of this litigation is an important milestone in that mission.”

In a decision in 2023, then-Federal Court judge Anthony Besanko upheld the newspapers’ truth defence and found to the civil standard of proof that Roberts-Smith was complicit in the murder of four unarmed prisoners, including a man with a prosthetic leg, while deployed in Afghanistan between 2009 and 2012.

Roberts-Smith lodged an appeal. The Full Court – Justices Nye Perram, Anna Katzmann and Geoffrey Kennett – said in a decision in May that the evidence was sufficiently cogent to support Besanko’s findings that Roberts-Smith murdered four Afghan men, contrary to the rules of engagement that bound the SAS.

The High Court refused special leave to appeal against that decision and ordered the former soldier to pay the newspapers’ legal costs.

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At the centre of the case was an allegation that Roberts-Smith machine-gunned the man with the prosthetic leg outside a compound dubbed Whiskey 108 during a mission on Easter Sunday, 2009.

The Full Court said it found “no error” in Besanko’s approach, pointing to three eyewitness accounts given in court.

“The problem for [Roberts-Smith] is that, unlike most homicides, there were three eyewitnesses to this murder,” the Full Court said.

“When all is said and done, it is a rare murder that is witnessed by three independent witnesses.”

The war veteran’s defamation case was aimed at The Age and the Herald, owned by Nine, and The Canberra Times, now under separate ownership. The trial started in 2021 and concluded in July 2022 after 110 days, 41 witnesses and a combined $30 million in legal costs. The appeal cost the parties a further $4 million.

Roberts-Smith’s former employer, Seven West Media chairman Kerry Stokes, bankrolled the trial using private funds but did not pay for the appeal. Stokes is on the hook for Nine’s costs in the trial.

Roberts-Smith agreed in 2023 to pay $910,000 into court as security for Nine’s legal costs as a condition of bringing the appeal.

The litigation was beset with twists and turns, including a failed application by Roberts-Smith to reopen his appeal before the Full Court’s decision was delivered to allow a “secret recording” of McKenzie to be admitted into evidence.

In a decision on legal costs, delivered on Thursday, the Full Court rejected an argument by Roberts-Smith that he should not be ordered to pay the newspapers’ costs of responding to that application.

His lawyers had argued there should be no costs order because the application raised a novel point and had a public interest character, but the Full Court did not accept that characterisation.

“[We] do not agree that the reopening application had a public interest character and we do not think it raised a question of general importance or difficulty,” the Full Court said.

https://www.theage.com.au/national/high-court-throws-out-ben-roberts-smith-s-defamation-appeal-bid-20250904-p5msc9.html

https://www.hcourt.gov.au/cases-and-judgments/special-leave

https://www.hcourt.gov.au/sites/default/files/special-leave-applications/2025-09/04-09-25%20Results.pdf

https://www.hcourt.gov.au/cases-and-judgments/judgments/special-leave-dispositions/roberts-smith-v-federal-capital-press-australia-acn-008-394-063-ors-1

https://www.judgments.fedcourt.gov.au/judgments/Judgments/fca/full/2025/2025fcafc0122

https://qresear.ch/?q=ben+roberts-smith

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Australian Army called in to assist Victoria Police in hunt for alleged cop killer Dezi Freeman

Specialist units from the Australian Army will join the search for Dezi Freeman after Victoria Police requested assistance to help find the alleged cop killer.

Patrick Hannaford - September 3, 2025

Specialist military units will be deployed in Porepunkah after Victoria Police requested ADF assistance to help track down alleged cop killer Dezi Freeman.

Hundreds of Victoria Police personnel have been deployed to Victoria’s high country to help find the self-proclaimed “sovereign citizen” since he allegedly shot and killed two police officers on August 26, however police have been unable to track down the 56-year-old nine days into the search.

Victoria Police have now requested assistance from the Australian Defence Force, with Defence Minister Richard Marles announcing the request would be met.

“The Australian Defence Force will work with Victorian police as they request our assistance in terms of the particular assets and capabilities,” Mr Marles told the ABC.

“We are providing a planning specialist in relation to this and that comes after a request from Victorian police.

“We’re also providing some air surveillance assets, again, coming after a request from Victorian police.”

Superintendent Brett Kahan revealed on Monday that Victoria Police believe Freeman is being helped or even harboured by local community members.

"People know the whereabouts of the person," Superintendent Kahan said.

"People have chosen — for whatever reason — not to come forward."

The latest revelations come as the Herald Sun revealed family and neighbours of Freeman had branded him a “coward” and a “hypocrite” who had benefitted from hundreds of thousands of dollars in taxpayer-funded welfare payments despite claiming not to recognise the legitimacy of the Australian state.

“He never worked, never had any money … that’s what used to sh*t me too because he was so against the government, but then got his Centrelink cheque every week,” one former neighbour said.

A relative of the fugitive told the Herald Sun he had been receiving a disability pension for more than 20 years, although they were unsure how he qualified for it, adding his family viewed him as a hypocrite.

“He always told everyone how poor he was and that he was the victim … The whole family kind of laughed at him,” the relative said.

https://www.skynews.com.au/australia-news/crime/australian-army-called-in-to-assist-victoria-police-in-hunt-for-alleged-cop-killer-dezi-freeman/news-story/750b4ddfc4280008a7120eed80f0985c

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Ms Walker-Davidson recalled how Senior Constable de Waart-Hottart would look forward to his weekly hours-long Skype calls with his parents Carolina de Waart and Alain Hottart, who travelled from Senior Constable de Waart-Hottart’s native country of Belgium to attend the funeral.

Ms de Waart delivered a tribute to her son read out by his cousin, Jeremy Dellavedova.

“Our beautiful, kind, wise, joyful boy, taken from us,” she said. “Mother Nature now holds him in her embrace. Vadim is everywhere now, in the ether, in the divine … Vadim will live among us as a soft breeze on our cheek, an unexpected, pure white butterfly hovering over my head.”

Mr Bush described Senior Constable de Waart-Hottart as one of the force’s “finest officers”. He was awarded the Victoria Police Star, an honour for officers who are killed or seriously injured, in addition to the National Police Service Medal, National Medal and Victoria Police Service Medal.

“They are in recognition, not just of the six years that he served us and his community, but acknowledging the years that he would have given, had he been allowed,” Mr Bush said.

The medals were displayed in the chapel, alongside a statue of Batman, who Senior Constable de Waart-Hottart idolised because he helped people.

Following the service, Senior Constable de Waart-Hottart’s hearse was driven through a guard of honour formed by his police colleagues, while the air wing conducted a flyover in tribute.

Senior Constable de Waart-Hottart was on temporary assignment in Wangaratta when he was killed alongside his colleague, Detective Leading Senior Constable Neal Thompson, last Tuesday. The two officers were shot while executing a search warrant in Porepunkah. A third officer was also seriously injured.

Mr Thompson’s funeral will be held on Monday.

Police continue to hunt for their alleged killer, Desmond Freeman.

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/my-superhero-brothers-tribute-tofallen-officer/news-story/2b1e9712a06070fa417ac9e685662c42

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=egnhCpzp0e8

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‘Real and likely risk of serious injury or death’ if neo-Nazi released, police say

Erin Pearson - September 3, 2025

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Neo-Nazi Thomas Sewell is likely to kill or seriously injure someone – or order one of his devoted followers to – unless he remains behind bars, police say.

Police allege Sewell is responsible for an attack on sacred Indigenous land that injured several people, as well as a string of other violent offences.

Detective Senior Constable Saer Pascoe told Melbourne Magistrates’ Court on Wednesday the 32-year-old from Balwyn, who leads the National Socialist Network, had complete control over a large contingent of members, who would attack others on his instruction and without hesitation.

Pascoe said Sewell had orchestrated an attack on people at Camp Sovereignty in Melbourne’s Kings Domain on Sunday that left one woman needing staples to secure a head laceration and others with minor wounds.

He said Sewell represented an unacceptable risk to the safety and welfare of the public if released on bail. The neo-Nazi was dramatically arrested outside Melbourne’s Magistrates Court on Tuesday, during a break in proceedings for a case in which he is accused of intimidating a police officer and his family last year. Sewell is representing himself in the matter.

“Although they present themselves as a self-political organisation, they have a documented history of hate crimes and acting with violence,” Pascoe said. “They also have a documented and recent history of violence incited and instructed by Thomas Sewell.

“He is their leader and has complete control.

“It’s almost certain the applicant will return to committing offences [if bailed]. There is a real and likely risk of serious injury or death.”

Pascoe said Sewell was unemployed, had recently been evicted from his Wantirna South home and was staying between a holiday campervan and his in-laws’ Balwyn home with his two young daughters, aged two and eight months.

He described the National Socialist Network as a neo-Nazi political organisation with white supremacist and anti-immigration ideology.

In addition to being charged over the Camp Sovereignty attack, Sewell is also facing fresh charges relating to the organisation’s August 9 event, in which police allege 200 neo-Nazis, led by Sewell, marched through the CBD and Bourke Street Mall dressed in black, carrying banners and chanting.

About 12.45am, police allege a man ran at Sewell and spat on the ground near him before punches were thrown. Other National Socialist Network members then knocked the victim to the ground, pulled away a bystander, and kicked the man in the head. The victim was taken to hospital. Sewell has been charged with assault and committing an indictable offence while on bail over the incident.

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On August 31, Sewell spoke on the steps of state parliament at an anti-immigration rally, which was also attended by other National Socialist Network members. There was also a counter-demonstration and the weekly pro-Palestine rally in the city, and groups clashed in the streets.

After most of the groups left, police allege a group of about 30 National Socialist Network members, led by Sewell, descended on Camp Sovereignty, a sacred site for the Indigenous community in Kings Domain.

The court heard Sewell had allegedly instructed the group to charge up a 30-metre hill towards the camp and attack occupants.

There, camera footage allegedly showed members attacking people, including holding two people down while another was kicked, while others were struck with a pole.

Sewell allegedly punched one man while fellow neo-Nazi Nathan Bull, who has also been charged, is alleged to have kicked another. One victim was allegedly hit while attempting to retrieve a drum that was damaged in the melee, while a woman was hospitalised and required staples to close a scalp wound.

Police are now working to identify at least 10 further alleged offenders.

Sewell was arrested on Tuesday and charged with more than 20 offences, including assault and violent disorder as the alleged main offender.

At the time, the court heard, Sewell was already on two counts of bail and facing charges of allegedly intimidating a police officer and his family, and breaching intervention orders, which he is currently contesting.

The detective said other allegations that remained before the courts include behaving in an offensive manner at the Eureka Stockade near Ballarat on December 3, 2023, and at the Chinese consulate in Toorak on October 26, 2024.

In providing examples of Sewell’s alleged escalating behaviour, Pascoe said the accused had attended a press conference held by Premier Jacinta Allan this week when he interrupted and shouted aggressively, resulting in Allan being extracted by her security.

“There is police intelligence regarding the NSN’s motivation and ideology. And they are very carefully watched,” Pascoe said.

Defence lawyer Matthew Hopkins appeared remotely from what appeared to be a house interstate, fighting reception issues throughout the hearing, and having to return using his mobile phone.

He said his client maintained his innocence and that during the Bourke Street Mall incident, he had been defending himself from an unprovoked attack. Hopkins also suggested the Camp Sovereignty attack had been provoked by the graffitiing of cars.

In pushing for bail, he said Sewell was not on bail currently for any physically violent offending and had a history of always attending court.

Hopkins then hit out at the police’s terminology, telling the magistrate his client had a constitutional implied right of political communication.

“I do note for many, many decades in this country there was a white Australia policy,” Hopkins said.

“[There is] an implied right to defend one’s political views.

“He will vigorously defend the charges against him. He will accept any [bail] conditions the court sees fit.”

Magistrate Donna Bakos said she would hand down her decision on bail on Friday.

“Am I allowed a book?” Sewell asked her as he was being led away. Bakos said she could not guarantee him access to a book in jail.

https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/real-and-likely-risk-of-serious-injury-or-death-if-neo-nazi-released-police-say-20250903-p5mrz7.html

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>>23555214

‘Endanger safety’: neo-Nazi will remain behind bars after alleged assault at Camp Sovereignty

Neo-Nazi Thomas Sewell will remain behind bars in custody after a court ruled that he was a risk to the “safety of others” if released on bail.

Clareese Packer - September 5, 2025

Neo-Nazi Thomas Sewell will remain behind bars in custody after he was denied bail over an alleged assault at a First Nations camp in Melbourne.

Magistrate Donna Bakos found there was a risk that Sewell could “endanger the safety and welfare of others” if released.

“People have the right to go about their lives without being confronted by hateful speech,” Ms Bakos told the Melbourne Magistrates Court on Friday morning.

She said the charges were “serious” and some “strike at the heart of a cohesive society”.

Sewell, 33, the leader of the National Socialist Network (NSN), was arrested after an alleged assault following the March for Australia anti-immigration rally.

Camp Sovereignty members at the sacred Indigenous site in Kings Domain were allegedly attacked by a group of about 30 men, led by Sewell, on August 31, with police alleging the attack was “unprovoked”.

“The NSN group was across the road … they ran some 30m up the hill to the camp,” Ms Bakos on Friday told the court of the allegations.

“At least three people were injured … one, a young woman, required staples to seal the wound to her scalp.”

Sewell was interviewed over the alleged assault and remanded in custody.

He was charged with 21 offences, including violent disorder, affray, seven charges of assault by kicking, five of discharge missile, and four of unlawful assault.

A court was earlier told he was unemployed but acted as the leader of the neo-Nazi political organisation NSN.

Ms Bakos emphasised that Sewell was not charged with any offences relating to his political views after arguments by his defence that the prosecutor’s evidence was a “political attack” on him.

The defence had argued there was “no evidence of a racially motivated ideology”, and this was merely a “contest of ideas”.

“It relates to charges for unlawful and violent conduct,” Ms Bakos said.

“Given the matters I have addressed, this application for bail must be refused.”

The court was told a police informant believed Sewell may not comply with bail conditions, and he had “complete control” over the NSN and “a large group of followers that will attack on his instruction without hesitation” at his disposal.

“The informant said that NSN members would also be put at risk by counter attacks by persons opposed to their views,” Ms Bakos said.

“(The informant believes) there is a real risk and likely risk of serious injury or death.”

The court was also told of police allegations that Sewell had engaged in behaviour “escalating in violence and in concerning behaviour” in recent times.

Police said this included an incident on August 9 in which Sewell allegedly assaulted a man during an NSN march in Melbourne’s CBD, a charge he also sought bail for on Friday.

It is alleged about 200 members of the NSN marched through Melbourne’s CBD about 12.30am, holding banners emblazoned with the words “white men fight back”.

Ms Bakos said Sewell was the only one from the large group not wearing a face covering.

The group were allegedly “chanting and holding up banners that depicted their ideology” when a man approached them and spat on the ground in Sewell’s direction.

The court was told Sewell then allegedly “raised his fists in a fighting stance” and lunged in the man’s direction, the pair trading blows after the man allegedly punched Sewell in the head.

The man was kicked in the head several times during the alleged incident and suffered cuts and abrasions to his face, the court was told.

Sewell was arrested on August 22 over the incident. He was released pending further inquiries and charged weeks later on September 2 with common law assault and committing an indictable offence while on bail.

https://www.news.com.au/national/victoria/courts-law/neonazi-thomas-sewell-denied-bail-over-alleged-assault-at-camp-sovereignty/news-story/75445225674283329833ce999f5aadbd

https://x.com/NoticerNews/status/1954157532840124826

>>23538724

Jacinta Nampijinpa Price ordered to remove flag in Senate chamber

RHIANNON DOWN - September 03, 2025

Liberal Jacinta Nampijinpa Price was ordered in the Senate chamber to remove an Australian flag that was wrapped around her shoulders, in the middle of a speech calling for the burning of the national ensign to be criminalised.

Her push for the burning of the Australian flag to become a criminal offence was interrupted on Wednesday when Greens senator Nick McKim raised a point of order that Senator Price was using a prop as part of her address.

The Indigenous senator was ordered to remove the flag from her shoulders while she finished her speech to avoid “setting a ­precedent”.

The incident took place amid mounting pressure to criminalise the burning or destruction of the national flag, with One Nation leader Pauline Hanson moving a motion that a criminal offence be created.

Senator Price said the flag represented the nation’s history and symbolised “gratitude” for the good fortune to live in Australia. “Our national flag reminds us of the duty of responsible citizenship, doing something that’s bigger than ourselves,” she said.

“For example, raising a family, contributing to one’s community, working hard in a chosen field, or serving the nation in some ­capacity.

“When one understands the history behind our national flag, when one values its symbolic weight, it’s beyond comprehension that the burning of our ­national flag is not a criminal ­offence.

“Like most Australians, I was appalled by the footage of pro-Palestinian protesters burning our national flag in Melbourne on Sunday, the third of August.”

Senator McKim raised a point of order about Senator Price’s use of the flag during her speech as contravening standing orders that forbid props.

“I do want to make the point that if it’s OK for Senator Nampijinpa Price to wrap herself in this flag, I would intend to wrap myself in a Palestinian flag and come into the chamber and exercise the same rights that Senator Nampijinpa Price is currently exercising,” he said.

Nationals senator Bridget McKenzie interjected that the flag was not a prop, declaring that it “sits in our chamber right now”.

Senator Hanson moved her motion late on Wednesday, which called for the Senate to “take immediate action to make it an offence to wilfully burn or desecrate the Australian national flag”.

“Shamefully, there are people who know what the flag means to so many Australians, and that’s why they despise it,” Senator Hanson said.

“They despise our people and our nation for their stupid, narrow, hateful causes and for the symbolic value of our flag.

“They choose to desecrate it. They choose to burn it in our streets.”

Senator Price spoke in support of the motion, wearing a dress emblazoned with the Australian flag under her blazer.

The motion came just hours after Senator Price singled out the Indian community as being a source of concern during nation-wide anti-immigration protests on Sunday, declaring that Labor was leaning on the diaspora for votes.

“As we have seen, you yourself mentioned, that there is a concern with the Indian community, and only because there’s been large numbers, and we can see that reflected in the way the community votes for Labor at the same time,” she told the ABC’s Afternoon Briefing.

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/politics/jacinta-nampijinpa-price-ordered-to-remove-flag-in-senate-chamber/news-story/72755cc1a369cf9357478a4dd9ef7bb9

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COMMENTARY: Trans lobby defends a lie that silences women

CHRIS UHLMANN - September 05, 2025

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Not all change is progress. Some of it is decay. Bad ideas do damage and, to borrow from Orwell, we live in an age where restating the obvious has become a civic duty.

So here goes: there is such a thing as binary sex. It is etched in your chromosomes and biology, and you cannot change it. Human beings are male or female. A vanishingly small number are intersex. That is a biological anomaly. It is not a third sex. We also use the words man and woman. That is gender. You can legally change your gender. If you wish to do so, good luck to you. No one should discriminate against you. But your rights are not the only rights, and when identity collides with reality in a plural society, compromise is unavoidable. As a general rule, the vast majority should not be forced to make profound changes to customs, laws and language to accommodate a tiny minority.

The legal right to change gender should not compel others to deny the reality of sex, because it is the definition of tyranny that you demand I sign up to a fantasy. Conceding that gender can be changed with nothing more than a form and a fee is a big enough leap. Conceding that sex is fluid is an assault on reason.

Giggle vs Tickle and a demand to deny reason

But the obvious is now being obscured. The concession to change the law on gender now leads to a demand to deny science. The activist playbook never changes: assert, extend, sanctify, silence. Sentiment overrules reason, and those who insist on fidelity to the truth are traduced. Who could have imagined that the ordinary meaning of male and female would one day be put on trial, and that the very body created to defend women’s rights would argue that “female” is essentially meaningless?

Yet that is exactly what is happening in the Giggle v Tickle case, in which Roxanne Tickle, a transgender woman, successfully sued the women-only social media app Giggle for Girls for excluding her, with the Federal Court finding this was unlawful indirect discrimination under the Sex Discrimination Act.

The case has gone to appeal and the Sex Discrimination Commissioner has intervened as a friend of the court, submitting that sex is “not a biological concept referring to whether a person at birth had male or female physical traits”.

“Nor is it a binary concept, limited to the ‘male’ or ‘female’ sex,” the commissioner’s submission argues. “The word ‘sex’ takes its ordinary meaning, which is informed by how that term is used throughout Australia including in state and territory legislation. ‘Sex’ can refer to a person being male, female, or another non-binary status. It is also broad enough to encompass the idea that a person’s ‘sex’ can be changed.”

The ordinary meaning of words is as old as the language itself, and the words “male” and “female” have carried stable, biologically rooted meanings in English for more than 600 years. Most Australians understand what those words mean and the Oxford Dictionary defines sex as “either of the main divisions (male and female) into which living things are placed on the basis of their reproductive functions”. By treating a legislative novelty a dozen years old as the measure of ordinary meaning, the commissioner has abandoned the highway of plain speech for a legal cul-de-sac of confusion.

(continued)

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When Labor’s Susan Ryan introduced the Sex Discrimination Bill in 1983, she made her purpose clear. The law was to give effect to the United Nations convention on the elimination of discrimination against women. That convention, and the Australian law that followed, were built on the recognition that women had been held back precisely because of things proper to their sex. Pregnancy and the possibility of pregnancy were named because they had long been used as reasons to sack women, deny them jobs, or block their advancement. Ryan told the Senate the bill would outlaw discrimination on the grounds of sex, marital status, or pregnancy. These protections were grounded in biology and were designed to secure equality for women as a group.

A Trojan horse wheeled inside the walls of the law

That clarity did not last. In 2013, the act was amended and the definitions of man and woman were quietly repealed to accommodate protections for gender identity. Where the law once spelled out that a man was a member of the male sex and a woman was a member of the female sex, the federal parliament now said those words should take their “ordinary meaning”. It was presented as a technical change, but it was nothing of the sort. It was a Trojan horse wheeled inside the walls of the law. The effect has been to light a fire that now burns the city of meaning to the ground. What was once fixed was unmoored.

This has opened a door for the commissioner to argue that even the act’s pregnancy provisions – protections written precisely for biological women because of their capacity to conceive – should be read as extending to trans women.

“The act defines ‘potential pregnancy’ to include the fact that the woman has expressed a desire to become pregnant, or that the woman is perceived as being likely to become pregnant. The repeal of the definition of ‘woman’, together with the comments in the 2013 notes on the law, suggest that a trans woman should be able to access protections like this, which in turn confirms that the word ‘woman’ is intended to include a trans woman.”

A trans woman may “desire” pregnancy, but no rational person could ever perceive her as capable of it. Yet the commissioner stretches the law to that absurdity, because the absence of definitions in the act allows it to conflate the moveable feast of gender with the biological reality of sex. That is a basic logical mistake, a category error, mixing up things that don’t belong together, like trying to measure temperature with a ruler.

Institutional betrayal of women

Parliament left this door ajar but the commissioner’s reasoning is as scrambled as its priorities. It ignores the common understanding of words, leaps across logic, and concludes that law can remake biology. That is like parliament declaring gravity does not exist. You can write it into a statute, but the apple still falls from the tree.

The terrifying thing in this is it takes a highly intelligent person to make an argument so reckless. Only an academic or a lawyer could do it. Only a court, a campus, or an inner-city dinner party could entertain the argument that the ­ordinary meaning of male and ­female is meaningless. It would not pass the pub test anywhere west of Chippendale.

The Sex Discrimination Act itself recognises that women sometimes need protections that are single-sex. Section 32 permits single-sex services where the nature of the service requires it, and section 42 expressly allows exclusion in competitive sporting activities where strength, stamina or physique are relevant. So, the act was written with the clear understanding that biology matters, and that there are circumstances in which women need spaces and protections of their own.

(continued)

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In dissolving the boundary between sex and gender, the commissioner is engaging in institutional betrayal. The office created to defend women now seeks to erase them. If the word “female” can be colonised by biological males, the law cannot protect women as women and every protection won over generations collapses. Even the experience of pregnancy and childbirth will be claimed by those who can never endure it. In the end, women lose not only their rights but their recognition. They will be pushed into a legal limbo, where their very existence as a class is denied.

The most insidious part of the commissioner’s argument is that it acts to silence women who dare to dissent. Women’s organisations already face orchestrated pressure to change their language and practice to accommodate aggressive activists. If sex is stripped of its biological anchor in law, on what grounds could any male who declares himself female be denied entry to real or virtual single-sex spaces?

Does the commissioner truly believe that in a world where any man can change gender by nomination alone, predatory men will not exploit that licence to prey on women?

The erasure of sex is just one skirmish in the war on reason waged by identity politics. It is an ideology aimed at dissolving the foundations of meaning, built on the belief that all human relationships are exercises in power. Confusion is the objective. When the meaning of basic terms is unmoored, power flows to those who dictate the new definitions.

The commissioner seems determined to etch a dangerous precedent into law. Its staff may feel on the right side of history, but they are morally adrift. They are defending a lie – and no law or court can make it true.

Chris Uhlmann is a Walkley Award winning journalist and broadcaster, having begun his media career at The Canberra Times and as a radio producer for the ABC in the late 1990s and early 2000s. He was most recently the ABC's political editor on its flagship 7.30 program.

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/commentary/australias-transgender-debate-iscreating-a-dangerous-precedent/news-story/033f38735d8249b77961eaf2536f9440