竹炉山房

今天澳媒两大与中国有关的新闻分别是：女总理吉拉德访华成功、朝鲜关闭中朝边境游客通道。

Gillard lands a big one with China deal

April 10, 2013

Mark Kenny
Chief political correspondent

Australia and China have formally committed to new annual leadership talks giving Canberra greater access than the Asian superpower has granted to virtually any other Western nation.

With countries across the world clamouring for the ear of the world's second-largest economy, Prime Minister Julia Gillard has landed the foreign policy triumph of her leadership, signing off on the new strategic partnership with her Chinese counterpart, Premier Li Keqiang.

Prime Minister Julia Gillard with year 11 students at Chenjinglun High School in Beijing. Photo: Pool

Under the agreement, annual meetings will now take place between the prime ministers of the two governments - an arrangement that exists as a formal process between China and only two other countries, Germany and Russia, as well as with the European Union.

Its formal completion follows months of intense behind-the-scenes negotiations and came on the last day of Ms Gillard's five-day visit to China in a ceremony in the Great Hall of the People on Tiananmen Square.

A buoyant Ms Gillard emerged from her bilateral talks with Mr Li describing the agreement as ''a breakthrough''.

''When the history of this relationship is written, I think this will be remembered as the day that a big step forward was taken," she said.

''I'm obviously pleased for our country . . . and now with this agreement we know we will command attention here in China.

''Naturally, new architecture will not do the work for us or make hard problems in our relationship easy,'' Ms Gillard said. ''What it will do is elevate our existing habits of dialogue and co-operation.''

While her government's electoral stocks remain disastrously low with few tipping a rebound solely on the basis of abstract foreign policy architecture, however historic in nature, Ms Gillard confidently claimed that voters intuitively recognise the strategic and economic importance of China and would come to appreciate what had been achieved.

''I think people in Australia understand how important China is to our economic future, I think they understand that very deeply,'' she said.

Ms Gillard said it was clear that many countries around the world were eager to get their issues aired before the Chinese leadership but Australia had positioned itself at front and centre.

Opposition Leader Tony Abbott has welcomed an agreement for annual talks with China, saying Australia had neglected the relationship before Ms Gillard's visit.

''When I was in Beijing last July I very strongly urged that there be an annual leadership dialogue at the top level of business and politics between Australia and China,'' Mr Abbott told Melbourne radio on Wednesday. ''It seems like the idea has come into fruition, so it's great.''

The annual forum will be supported by additional permanent resources as well as annual meetings at sub-leadership level, involving both foreign ministers.

A new ''strategic economic dialogue'' is also a key underpinning to be led by Australia's treasurer and trade minister, and on China's side, by the chairman of the National Development and Reform Commission, regarded by close China watchers as among its most influential economic positions.

Free trade talks with China, which have been stalled now for some years, may get a boost with the next meetings to take place in May.

Trade Minister Craig Emerson, said Mr Li had ''looked around for the trade guy'' during the meeting, suggesting trade liberalisation was a higher priority for the new leadership than the previous one.

The two governments also signed into law the start of direct trading of Australian dollars and the Chinese currency, removing the need for an intermediate transfer into US dollars.

Fairfax believes the push to establish the new strategic partnership, a long-held Australian ambition, was accelerated last year by Ms Gillard, who believed the looming change in China's leadership from then president Hu Jintao and premier Wen Jiabao to Xi Jinping and Li Keqiang respectively, presented a new opportunity.

After writing to Mr Hu in April of last year, she dispatched to Beijing one of Australia's most senior bureaucrats, Dennis Richardson, to build the case.

China's recognition of the relationship with Australia as a ''strategic partnership'' reflects the rapidly growing two-way trade, running at nearly $130 billion a year, as well as the leadership roles played globally and regionally by both countries.

Australia and China are co-members of the UN Security Council (China as a permanent member), the powerful G20, APEC and the East Asia Summit.

Australia has established comparable agreements with Indonesia and India, the latter inaugurated by Ms Gillard last year.

Yesterday's signing ceremony also formalised agreements for co-operation and co-ordination of development aid by both nations in the Asia Pacific region.

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/political-news/gillard-lands-a-big-one-with-china-deal-20130409-2hjjw.html#ixzz2Q20DYoxb

PM puts name on board and gets relationship on track

April 10, 2013

John Garnaut
China correspondent for Fairfax Media

Julia Gillard has not been known as an international stateswoman and nor is she a Sinophile but on Tuesday she ended years of leadership neglect and policy confusion to put the China relationship on track.

Which is just as well.

These days China not only underwrites the Australian economy, it sits at or near the centre of all the global challenges that matter to us most.

The centre pole of the new ''architecture'', as diplomats like to call it, is a three-point annual dialogue involving the Australian Prime Minister, Foreign Minister and Treasurer.

And if anyone needs a refresher on the breadth of issues at stake they need only look at the myriad agreements signed after Prime Minister Gillard and Premier Li Keqiang's meeting - with full military honours - at the Great Hall of the People on Tuesday night.

There is an agreement to trade Chinese renminbi directly in Australian dollars, only the third such agreement China has entered into.

There was a pilot program to allow Chinese arrivals - and there were 650,000 last year - to electronically swipe their passports through customs in Australia's otherwise unwelcoming airports.

There was an agreement on climate change, with ambitions to connect carbon trading markets in both nations.

There was a crucial agreement to link the aid bureaucracies as they plan public health programs in the South Pacific, which could be crucial for regional stability.

There was even a defence strategy forum that will allow the Australians to ease Chinese fears.

When Gough Whitlam turned Australian foreign policy on its head in 1972 he dispatched inaugural ambassador Stephen FitzGerald with the instructions: ''We seek a relationship with China based on friendship, co-operation and mutual trust comparable with that which we have or seek with other major powers.''

FitzGerald watched Whitlam's successors pursue those goals until, bizarrely, China's potential as a global power became reality.

''Australia has to have a China strategy, but it has to think about China itself before it can have a China strategy,'' he wrote in a scathing essay in February this year. But now, after ambassador Frances Adamson rang to walk him though the detail, he's ready to give his highest possible endorsement.

''We're getting there on China,'' FitzGerald said. ''These are the things that we've wanted to happen for a long time. I think Gough would be pleased.''

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/political-news/pm-puts-name-on-board-and-gets-relationship-on-track-20130409-2hjjy.html#ixzz2Q20QFFvD

李克强同吉拉德会谈：不断充实完善中澳战略伙伴关系

2013年04月09日 22:24  中国证券网

国务院总理李克强9日在人民大会堂同澳大利亚总理吉拉德举行会谈。

李克强表示，稳定健康发展的中澳关系符合两国根本利益，也有利于地区和世界的和平、稳定与发展。近年来，中澳关系继续蓬勃发展，双边贸易额在国际金融危机背景下翻了一番，人文交流日益活跃，合作成果丰硕。今天，我们正式启动两国总理年度定期会晤机制。中方愿与澳方一道，秉持《中澳联合声明》精神，密切高层交往，增进战略互信，建立和充实完善中澳相互信任、互利共赢的战略伙伴关系。同时，我们还确定建立外交与战略对话、战略经济对话等机制，促进多渠道交流合作。

李克强指出，中澳深化合作有条件，更有需要。双方应从各自发展战略出发，劲往一处使，不断提升合作水平：

在经贸领域，加强双边金融货币合作，开展人民币与澳元直接交易。开展多种形式的矿业、农牧业合作，加强铁路、港口、电信等基础设施建设领域互利合作。顺应区域经济一体化潮流，加快中澳自贸协定谈判，力争取得实质进展。

在人文领域，用好友好城市、孔子学院等平台，深化文化、教育、科技、旅游、地方等领域交流合作，积极支持两国青年人到对方国家学习，让两国文明发展成果更好地交流互鉴。

在多边领域，作为亚太稳定与发展的受益者和地区重要国家，中澳可在增进地区国家间互信、团结与合作方面发挥引领作用，加强防务交流，密切在联合国、二十国集团、亚太经合组织等多边事务中的沟通协调。

吉拉德表示，澳中建立战略伙伴关系标志着两国关系迈上新台阶。澳方愿本着相互尊重、互利共赢原则，同中方共同努力，搞好两国总理定期会晤机制及其他各种对话机制，加强宏观政策协调，加深互信，推动各领域合作，为维护亚太和平、稳定与繁荣作出贡献。

会谈后，两国总理出席了双方在可再生能源、融资、禁毒、发展援助等领域合作文件签字仪式。

会谈前，李克强在人民大会堂东门外广场为吉拉德举行欢迎仪式。

North Korea closes China border to tourists

April 10, 2013 - 1:25PM

The biggest border crossing between North Korea and China has been closed to tourist groups, a Chinese official says, as nuclear tensions mounted, but business travel was allowed to continue.

"Travel agencies are not allowed to take tourist groups to go there, since the North Korean government is now asking foreign people to leave," the official at the Dandong Border Office said.

"As far as I know, business people can enter and leave North Korea freely," added the official, who declined to give his name, without making clear which country had ordered the move.

North Korean soldiers patrol along the bank of the Yalu River in the North Korean town of Sinuiju across from the Chinese city of Dandong. Photo: AFP

China is North Korea's sole major ally and the provider of the vast majority of its trade and aid, with most of the business passing through Dandong.

A woman surnamed Wu at a travel agency in the town said municipal authorities told it on Tuesday that because of tensions in Pyongyang, Dandong travel firms would not be able to take tours into North Korea from Wednesday.

"It was absolutely North Korea's [decision] because the travel bureau told us 'North Korea is now no longer allowing tour groups to be taken in'," the woman said.

An AFP photographer at the border on Wednesday saw cars and a larger vehicle passing over the bridge crossing the Yalu river that marks the frontier, in both directions.

On Tuesday, Pyongyang advised foreigners to consider leaving South Korea, warning that the Korean peninsula was headed for "thermo-nuclear" war.

Last week, North Korean authorities also warned embassies in Pyongyang to consider evacuating as it would be unable to guarantee diplomats' safety in the event of conflict, but the statement was largely dismissed as empty rhetoric.

Most governments made it clear they had no plans to withdraw personnel.

The Korean peninsula has been locked in a cycle of escalating military tensions since the North's third nuclear test in February, which drew toughened UN sanctions.

Pyongyang's bellicose rhetoric has reached fever pitch in recent weeks, with near-daily threats of attacks on US military bases and South Korea in response to ongoing South Korean-US military exercises.

AFP

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/world/north-korea-closes-china-border-to-tourists-20130410-2hkpv.html#ixzz2Q20inoYM

这两件事当然不是孤立的，中国需要澳洲提供丰富的原料（铁、铀）、大幅推动以人民币结算的国际经济新秩序、在东北亚局势发生动荡时提供稳定的周边环境、在美国重返亚太时分化瓦解一个潜在的对手使其趋于中立，因此建立了战略级的对话也是不足为奇的（目前与北京定位为战略级对话的只有德、俄二国，以及欧盟），而澳洲需要中国成为其最大的投资和商贸伙伴。尽管我认为，在商贸方面澳洲有求于中国太多，而在地缘政治方面中国又期望过大，但好在两国间没有历史包袱，在澳的华人移民很多，在中国的澳洲移民也不少且澳洲人天生有融入殖民地的传统，因此彼此信任度会较高。

诚挚希望中澳关系能借此更上一层楼！