Sky News host Chris Kenny says to stand up to China, Australia must “live the right values” at home.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s account on the Chinese social media platform WeChat was hacked, and Beijing warned foreign athletes heading to China for next month’s Winter Olympics could be punished if they say the wrong thing while they are in the country.
“We rightly attack China for this sort of threat, this sort of attempted control, we deplore it – but do we live our own values?” Mr Kenny said.
He said one example of this is the treatment of tennis player Novak Djokovic.
“We gave him a visa and then cancelled it, he appealed in our courts and won, then instead of accepting the ruling of our courts, the minister expelled him for his views.”
“We’d be disgusted if China did that, and rightly so.
“Yes, we must stand up to China over human rights abuses, Chinese thought control, and Chinese censorship – but to do that we have to live the right values at home, we have to value and defend free speech here, we have to have freedom of expression here.
“Right now, our country is exposed by its own hypocrisy on these matters, and that deeply worries me.”