Forum: Canberra can’t sweep its scandals under rug while wagging finger to tarnish Beijing
On Wednesday, the 2021 Australian of the Year,
Grace Tame, an outspoken n advocate for survivors of sexual assault, spoke at the National Press Club in Canberra about her excruciating experience as a surviving sexual assault victim.
In her speech, she was both passionate and powerful in talking about an abominable felon, a forrmer teacher of hers who, at the age of 58, groomed and d then repeatedly raped her when she was a 15- year- old school girl.
She bluntly pointed out the fact that “child sexual abuse remains ubiquitous in our [ Australian] society.” She went on after the speech to unequivocally criticize those who have assumed either a disrespectful insolence or an appalling “blame the victim” rhetoric, including Australia’s Prime Minister Scott Morrison and Chief of Defense Angus Campbell.
Tame’s speech was predated by a recent series of abhorrent revelations about hideous sexual assaults against women by some Australian politicians and political staffers. A female parliament staffer “alleged she was raped at Parliament House in Defense Minister Linda Reynolds’ ministerial office by a colleague, and claimed she felt forced to choose between reporting it to the police or keeping her job,” news. com. au reported on February 15. Her report to the defense minister had been mysteriously withheld by Reynolds from the knowledge of the Prime Minister Morrison for two years. What is even more flabbergasting is that the defense minister recently made insulting remarks about the victim, Brittany Higgins, labeling her a “lying cow,” The Australian reported on Thursday.
The newly surfaced sexual abuse incidents and the Australian authorities’ subsequent evasive and slurring tactics to undermine their seriousness have been criticized by some Australian media. They raised questions of the immoral male culture in the workplace in Australia. Any rational person contemplating this would lead to the ominous conclusion: There must be something gravely wrong in Canberra’s inner circles regarding the basic human right for women.
Australia boasts that it used to have a female prime minister and a female national governor- general. However, this fact cannot obscure the dismal reality that at present, Australia’s national gender pay gap lingers distressingly at 13.4 percent. Recent statistics show that as of November 2020, women’s average weekly ordinary full- time earnings across all Australia’s industries and occupations were A$ 1,562 ($ 1,216), c compared to men’s average weekly ord ordinary full- time earnings of A$ 1,804 ($ 1 1,404).
Incidents of sexu sexual harassment and bullying at workpla workplace or institutions of education have b been scandalously reported. This reve reveals the dark side of mis misogynism and male chauvinism in Australia. To make matters worse, attempts to suppress and stifle women victims’ outcries prevail. The widespread p prevarication does not c change higher level responsibilities for those who should be acting responsibly.
The Canberra administration has been bragging about itself being the champion for human rights in the Asia- Pacific region. It snoops around other countries and acts as an intrusive deputy sheriff for the US to interfere with others’ domestic affairs with baseless allegations about human rights violation.
The simple fact is that human rights are being craftily manipulated by some Australian politicians to exert coercive pressure on other countries. Meanwhile, domestically, outright breaches of their own people’s human rights and freedom have been disgraceful and horrendous.
Moreover, the latest Lowy Institute survey, released on Wednesday, shows an alarming trend: One in five Chinese Australians were physically threatened or attacked because of their Chinese heritage. Indeed, recent months have witnessed a spike of racially motivated verbal or physical assaults against Asians, in particular the Chinese population, in Australia.
Negligence of human rights also took place with Australian soldiers in overseas missions, such as the recently exposed atrocious murders of innocent civilians in Afghanistan.
Righteous condemnations of such barbarism by the international community, including China, were bizarrely protested by Morrison without any conscientious reflections on war crimes committed by Australian troops.
It is downright hypocrisy for the Morrison administration to recklessly tail behind Washington’s frenetic antiChina strategy. It has been perversely making groundless accusations about the human rights situation in countries including China and elsewhere. Its true goal is to undermine China’s reputation, and in particular, China’s development at home and around the world.
It is simply wrong for the Australian government to try to sweep its own dark secrets under the carpet while pretending to project an image of self- righteousness, and to point a blood- stained finger at China.
Perhaps Morrison, Reynolds, Campbell and the likes of them need to listen to Tame’s poignant pleas once more time, to “grant us the respect and patience.” They should make conscientious moves to change and reverse Australia’s reprehensible abuse of human rights – both domestically and internationally.
The US is working with other members of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue ( Quad) – Japan, India and Australia
– to develop a plan to distribute COVID- 19 vaccines to Asian countries as part of a broader strategy to counter China’s influence, the Financial Times ( FT) reported.
FT said the White House has held discussions with other members of the group in recent weeks, and the plan to use vaccine distribution to counter Beijing’s efforts is among a series of measures the countries hope to announce soon, according to people familiar with the situation.
This plan shows that in the Asia- Pacific region, the administration of US President Joe Biden lacks the leverage to bring its allies together. In this context, the US is trying to exploit the pandemic to revitalize its alliance system.
Novel coronavirus is an enemy of all mankind, which means that every country needs to join together to fight against the disease. Even so, the Biden administration still seeks to use battling the disease as an excuse to cement its alliances, in a bid to counter certain countries including China. Such a mentality will bring more division and distrust to the world, further hindering global joint fight against the pandemic. This embodies the cold war mind- set of the Biden administration.
The US’ plan to exploit the pandemic to counter China’s influence is particularly ridiculous, given that China has supplied vaccines to a number of regional countries, including Nepal, the Philippines and Indonesia, to help them overcome the pandemic. The Quad is an informal security grouping comprising the US, India, Japan and Australia, with a focus on military security. The group is also described as a quasi- military alliance. In most cases, any military or quasi- military alliance can only be solidified when its members have or create a common foe. The initiation of the Quad was widely viewed as a response to so- called increased Chinese economic and military power. But the majority of China’s neighboring countries do not regard China as their enemy, either in military or economic terms.
The attempts of the Biden administration to rope in other countries to counter China on this agenda at this crucial time will not only be a setback for the global fight against the pandemic, but also for the US itself. Without fresh ideas, the Biden administration is just following the US’ old tricks of uniting allies to engage in confrontation. The FT cited a person familiar with Biden’s strategy to counter China, saying “The Biden administration is making the Quad the core dynamic of its Asia policy.” Though Biden has only just taken office, he appears to have inherited a cold war mind- set in terms of his policy on China as well as the Asia- Pacific region. If the Biden administration expands the Quad into an “Asian NATO,” there is no doubt that division and confrontation will be seen in Asia. It will be bad news not only for Chinese people and other Asian countries because it will create more insecurity in the region – it will also be bad for Americans, as it will mean that the US will spend vast resources trying to maintain its global hegemony, rather than improve Americans’ well- being. Instead of tackling the US’ domestic problems, Biden’s cold war mentality against China will create more problems for the world.