Alarm grows at China’s influence in East Timor
And it should!
On the day that Rudd pledged to deepen relations between China and Australia, China and East Timor signed a $28 million deal for East Timor to buy two advanced patrol boats. They can’t afford to maintain and crew the old ones they have now so who benefits most from the deal?
While Rudd castigates the Chinese over Tibet to allow his media circus to report back to Australia just how important Rudd is, the Chinese are busy white anting us in the Pacific. I wonder if this matter came up in discussions between the Chinese Leader and Australia’s Chief Clerk…I doubt it yet I would have thought it should have been foremost in Rudd’s list of things to discuss.
I feel uneasy about China’s increasing influence in our backyard particularly while we have a Sino- centric government.
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So while we consider which countries to give our old patrol boats to,
China gives them two new advanced ones.
Also, China builds East Timor an extravagent Foreign Ministry, a huge Chinese Embassy, and
an extravagant Presidential Palace on the site where Australian
troops reside.
China is training the boat crew and others in China.
No doubt in 5 star hotel accommodation. I’ll bet there will be
maintenance assistance for the boats as well.
I think it is good to have a PM who knows China. Chinese think like
Sun Tzu in politics and business – like the timing of signing things.
Re the patrol boats, I think in the long term they worry about
the security of their gas supplies, but in any country there are
some fringe elements. I hope the 2020 summit talks a little about
the future influence of China.
I hope the 2020 summit talks a little about
the future influence of China.>/i>
It won’t. There are cabinet ministers in the ALP who encourage Chinese dominance in the Pacific and elsewhere
“Chinese think like Sun Tzu in politics and business.”
And some think like Lao Tzu. There is an anti-authoritarian vein through Chinese history – not in the ascendancy at the moment. It will be interesting to see how a comfortable Chinese middle class develops politically.