Insiders fear China critic ASPI could be targeted in think tank funding cuts
A broad review into federal funding for national security think tanks was quietly announced last week. Some believe it could have a narrow focus on "anti-Chinese" outfit, the Australian Strategy Policy Institute.
In 2020 at a plush Canberra hotel, a Chinese embassy official handed Channel 9 journalist Jonathan Kearsley a slip over paper. As relations between the two countries sunk to new lows, the document outlined Beijing’s 14 grievances with Canberra.
Among them was federal government funding for an “anti-China think tank” – the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) – which China accused of peddling lies about internment camps of Uighurs in the northwest region of Xinjiang.
In Senate estimates on Monday, Coalition foreign affairs spokesman Simon Birmingham questioned whether ASPI was now being targeted to appease Beijing.
“Is this review … looking in any way at the way in which think tanks or these organisations impact on those types of foreign relations?” he asked Department of Prime Minister and & Cabinet (PM&C) first assistant secretary Lachlan Colquhoun.
