Australia is spreading state sponsored propaganda which is uncritically repeated in its private media companies, at the behest of its arms companies, for regime change in China

China is Australias largest trading partner. If the Australians want to shoot themselves in the foot for their incredibly poor leadership which is beholden to the US, the Murdoch empire and arms companies then they can get fucked

Read the below and let me know if you think any self respecting country in Europe/US or Canada would tolerate what Australia is doing let alone to the 2nd largest economy in GDP and number 1 economy in PPP

The Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) and Washington, DC-based Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) are the main institutions responsible for the forced labor studies. The reports have also relied heavily on an evangelical religious fanatic billed as the “leading expert” on Xinjiang, Adrian Zenz, who has said he is “led by God” on a “mission” against China.

Both ASPI and CSIS are right-wing, militaristic think tanks funded by US and Western governments, mega-corporations, and an eye-popping array of weapons manufacturers. As previously reported by The Grayzone, Adrian Zenz is a far-right fundamentalist Christian whose questionable but incendiary accusations against China have led to the Western press crowing him as the leading international “expert” on Xinjiang. Zenz’s most recent claims of “forced labor” were published by a “journal” founded and managed by US and NATO military operatives

The three reports relied upon in the recent “forced labor” media coverage are authored by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI), Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), and Adrian Zenz. While presented by the Western press as impartial, expert assessments, a closer look raises serious concerns about the biases and credibility of these “studies.”

While ASPI describes itself as a “an independent, non-partisan think tank” — a characterization that has been parroted by the Western press — it is, in fact, a right-wing, militaristic outfit that was founded by the Australian government in 2001 and is funded by the country’s Department of Defence.

ASPI is sponsored by a host of weapons manufacturers, including Raytheon Australia, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, MBDA Missile Systems, Saab AB, Thales, and Austalia.

Ironically, Australia’s Foreign Influence Transparency Scheme — enacted by the center-right Liberal Party to monitor alleged threat of “Chinese political interference” in the country — has revealed ASPI’s extensive sources of foreign funding, including the US State Department, UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO), government of Japan, and NATO.

ASPI blasted for being US lackey, promoting new Cold War with China

A recent profile of ASPI in the Australian Financial Review notes that the organization has “been accused of fomenting anti-China hysteria, to the alleged benefit of its benefactors.” ASPI has been so bellicose it has come in for criticism from major figures in Australian foreign policy circles.

Former Australian Foreign Minister Bob Carr has slammed ASPI for pushing a “one-sided, pro-American view of the world”, while the former Australian ambassador to China Geoff Raby added that ASPI is “the architect of the China threat theory in Australia”.

Australian Senator Kim Carr of the Labour Party has echoed the criticism of ASPI, condemning the think tank for seeking to “promote a new cold war with China” in collaboration with the US. In a February 2020 parliamentary session, Carr warned that “[i]n parts of the [Australian] defence and security establishment, there are hawks intent on fighting a new cold war” with China, highlighting ASPI’s extensive funding from the US State Department’s Global Engagement Center, headed by former CIA officer and Navy fighter pilot Lea Gabrielle.

ASPI’s ‘forced labor’ report relies on far-right blog of religious fanatics

The ASPI report presents no original evidence from workers who have been forced to work in this program, but cites anonymous “testimonies” from an obscure, far-right online blog. Called Bitter Winter, the blog is a project of the Center for Studies on New Religions (CESNUR), an Italy-based organization that opposes what it calls “anti-cult terrorism”.

Bitter Winter and its parent organization have vigorously defended fanatical Chinese religious movements including Falun Gong and the Church of the Almighty God, or Eastern Lightning. The latter is a Chinese-Christian sect which believes that Jesus Christ has been reincarnated as a Chinese woman currently living in Queens, New York.

Eastern Lightning is notorious for mass kidnappings, assaults, and murderous violence against perceived “demons” or non-believers, including bludgeoning a woman to death for refusing to give recruiters her phone number in 2014. During the 2019 Israeli elections, Buzzfeed reported that Twitter suspended dozens of Hebrew-language accounts run by the cult for “amplifying political messages for right-wing [Israeli] politicians.”

CESNUR has also taken up the cause of the Japanese doomsday cult, Aum Shinrikyo which was responsible for the 1995 Tokyo sarin gas attack. CESNUR board member J. Gordon Melton was paid by Aum Shinrikyo to travel to Japan to document alleged human rights violations against the group.

CESNUR founder, Massimo Introvigne, is the editor-in-chief of Bitter Winter. Introvigne is an ultra-conservative religious zealot who contends that Christians are “the most persecuted group in the world” due to abortion, gay marriage, and hate speech laws which he contends supress their religious freedom.

Introvigne considers communism to be an existential threat to religion, writing that “[n]egotiating with Beijing is like the proverbial supping with the Devil.” Introvigne regularly appears in videos produced by Church of the Almighty God/Eastern Lightning advocating on their behalf and claiming the cult is the victim of “propaganda” and “fake news”.

Introvigne has deep roots in the religious far-right, and was a long-time member and former vice president of the Italian organization Alleanza Cattolica, participating in the group from 1972 until 2016. During his time with the organization, Alleanza Cattolica advocated for Chilean military dictator Augusto Pinochet to be released following his arrest in the UK; denounced the progressive World Social Forum as a “laboratory for subversion”; and endorsed the Northern League, a far-right, anti-immigrant, Islamophobic political party, in Italian elections.

The “director-in-charge” of Bitter Winter is Marco Respinti, a far-right Christian conservative who describes his work as “devoted to serve and protect the Western heritage of life, liberties, and property” and working towards a society of “limited government, free enterprise, natural family, and traditional moral values.” Respinti is a Senior fellow at the Russell Kirk Center for Cultural Renewal and a founding member of the Center for European Renewal, two ardently conservative organizations, and editor-in-chief of the anti-gay, anti-choice publication International Family News.

https://thegrayzone.com/2020/03/26/forced-labor-china-us-nato-arms-industry-cold-war/