By ALEX JOSKEFEB. 6, 2018
 |
| Sébastien Thibault |
CANBERRA, Australia — On a September night in 2016, I took my seat
at a theater in the heart of Canberra for a Chinese national day celebration
organized by the pro-Beijing Chinese Students and Scholars Association. There
was a commotion and all of the seats around me were suddenly filled by men in
black suits communicating with walkie-talkies. They followed me into the
bathroom and tried to have the theater’s security staff kick me out.
Earlier, I had reported for a student newspaper on Chinese
government ties to the group and its efforts to censor anti-Communist Party
material at my university. I later identified the men at the theater as members
of the Chinese student association, and it was clear that the attempt to
intimidate me was a result of my articles.
Beijing’s reach into Australia goes far beyond groups like the
student association. Its interference in Australian society is becoming
increasingly bolder. And as Australians debate how to respond, the voices of
the Chinese-Australians alarmed by Beijing’s encroachment are being drowned out
by an aggressive Chinese government campaign to silence critics here.
With so many Chinese-Australians left unheard, misunderstandings
surrounding the Chinese-Australian community are rife. More than one million Australians
claim Chinese ancestry, out of a total population of about 24 million.
The Chinese Communist Party is actively fostering in the
Chinese-Australian community what the Nobel Peace Prize laureate Liu Xiaobo,
who died while in custody in China last year, called an “enemy mentality”: the
idea that the liberal West is China’s enemy and that supporters of freedom are
enemies, too. Those objecting to the Communist Party’s oppression, like
pro-democracy activists, are widely referred to as “poison” or “hostile
forces.”
Fear is among Beijing’s most potent weapons in silencing
Chinese-Australians. Like me, other Chinese-Australian critics of Beijing are
targets of threats and intimidation. Last year, a Sydney-based university
professor, Feng Chongyi, was detained in China for a week. The
Chinese-Australian artist Guo Jian was briefly detained in 2014 after creating
a diorama of Tiananmen Square to commemorate the 1989 massacre.
China also monitors the social media accounts of dissidents in
Australia, and many fear that their private messages and social networks might
make them targets of the Chinese government. Badiucao, a Chinese-Australian
cartoonist and street artist, has never revealed his face or real name out of
fear.
Even those who avoid actively criticizing Beijing are affected. Last
month, word spread of a Taiwanese waitress in Sydney who claimed that she had
been asked by her boss at a Chinese hot-pot restaurant if she thought Taiwan
belonged to China. “Definitely not,” she replied, and a few minutes later found
herself without a job.
As part of Beijing’s campaign, Chinese-language media here, relied
on by the many Chinese-Australians for whom English is a second language, are
pressured into self-censoring. These news outlets avoid any criticism of the
Communist Party. Beijing has also been quietly expanding its state-owned media
across the globe, including into Australia, by buying stakes in local Chinese
media. Posts on WeChat, a social media app owned by the Chinese conglomerate
Tencent that is widely used among Australia’s Chinese, can be deleted at
Beijing’s whim.
Beijing’s control of the Chinese-language news media helps to
elevate the pro-Beijing voices here, while critics of Beijing find themselves
with few public platforms. Prominent supporters of Beijing are rewarded by
Beijing with trips to China.
Few Chinese organizations publicly opposing the Chinese Communist
Party are left, their rallying power having been stunted by the lack of
coverage by Chinese-language news outlets. And some independent organizations
have been taken over by pro-Beijing members, who then change the club’s
mission.
Beijing’s domination of the conversation in the Chinese community
gives the wider public a skewed view of Chinese-Australians. The rest of the
country is left with the impression that Chinese-Australians are a unified bloc
that supports Beijing. One right-wing commentator even wrote an article titled,
“A Million Chinese Here May Not All Be on Our Side.” This mind-set affects Australia’s
policymaking process.
Beijing’s agents here are also keen to remind Australians of this
country’s shameful history of racism against Chinese. The result is that when a
Chinese-Australian is accused of having ties to Beijing, he may cry racism, saying
that he’s being tarnished by connections to Beijing only because he’s ethnic
Chinese. In the absence of balanced reporting in the Chinese-language media,
many Australians are inclined to believe these claims.
A series of new bills in Parliament on foreign interference,
including the introduction of a foreign-agents register and a ban on foreign
political donations, would weaken Beijing’s levers of control among
Chinese-Australians. It may also inspire new confidence among
Chinese-Australians that our struggles are being recognized, that we are no
longer being left to fend for ourselves in this fight against coercion.
Still, many Chinese-Australians feel frustrated by the way we are
viewed and represented. All Chinese-Australians should have the right to voice
their opinions without fearing reprisals by Beijing.
So-called Chinese community leaders who do not in fact represent
most Chinese-Australians should be forthcoming about their ties to the
Communist Party. And those who do not reveal their ties should be called out
not just in English-language media but also in the Chinese-language press.
Independent Chinese-Australian community groups should be supported.
The Australian government must do its part to put an end to
Beijing’s coercive influence on the local Chinese-language news media and the
broader Chinese community. Our government should use diplomatic and security
channels to push back against pressure on the media and Beijing’s takeover of
Chinese community groups. The independence and reach of publicly funded
Mandarin and Cantonese news outlets should be ensured and expanded.
Chinese-Australians are not powerless. We need to speak up. But it’s
also time for all Australians, regardless of ethnic background, to unite to
protect the country’s sovereignty and dignity. If we are truly a nation of
tolerance and freedom, all Australians should support Chinese-Australians’
freedom of expression.
Alex Joske is a China researcher and student at the Australian
National University.
Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook and Twitter
(@NYTopinion), and sign up for the Opinion Today newsletter.
（This article is reprinted from other source. Its contents, analysis and conclusions may not reflect those as supported or advocated by AVA）
No comments:
Post a Comment