SYDNEY: Australia rebuffed China’s appeal to “join hands” to defend trade on Thursday, as Beijing looks for partners to help it blunt US tariffs now ratcheted up to 125 percent.
Ambassador Xiao Qian urged Australia and other trading partners to “jointly respond to the changes of the world” in an opinion piece written for a Sydney newspaper.
“Under the new circumstances, China stands ready to join hands with Australia,“ Xiao wrote for the Sydney Morning Herald.
But Australia’s defence minister Richard Marles was quick to pour cold water on notions of Canberra and Beijing uniting in “common cause”.
“We’re not about to make common cause with China, that’s not what’s going to happen here,“ Marles told Australia’s Nine News.
“I don’t think we’ll be holding China’s hand.
“We don’t want to see a trade war between America and China, to be clear, but our focus is on actually diversifying our trade.”
Australia is one of the United States’ most steadfast security allies in a region coming to grips with China’s rising military, economic and diplomatic might.
But China is also Australia’s largest trading partner.
Australia has been slugged with a blanket 10 percent tariff on goods exported to the United States, despite some lawmakers questioning why Washington would seek to punish a friend.
US President Donald Trump abruptly paused the highest tariffs on most countries Wednesday after admitting they made the markets nervous, but doubled down on a spiralling trade war with China.
Trump said he was raising tariffs on China to 125 percent because of a “lack of respect”.
US levies on Australia were also unchanged.
