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AFA Monthly is a free email published each month by Australian Foreign Affairs.
Written and curated by editor Grant Wyeth, it features news and insights on crucial world events and their effect on Australia, in a style that’s clear, succinct and free of jargon.
It also offers a round-up of the month's key articles by leading foreign policy thinkers from Australia and around the world.
Read previous editions
28 November 2018
Morrison backs Trump
This Saturday, Donald Trump and Xi Jinping will meet at an unnamed restaurant after the G20 meeting in Buenos Aires for a summit – or showdown – to try to end their countries’ trade war. Ahead of the encounter, Trump threatened to impose further tariffs on $US267 billion worth of Chinese imports from 1 January 2019, a move that would likely …
21 November 2018
China raises red flags
Seven years ago Hillary Clinton, then the US secretary of state, warned of her country’s growing competition with China, and pinpointed a nation over which the two powers seemed to be coming into conflict: Papua New Guinea. “[The Chinese] have brought all of the leaders of these small Pacific nations to Beijing, wined them and dined them,” …
14 November 2018
Getting closer to Japan
On Friday, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzō Abe will make an historic visit to Darwin, seventy-six years after the first attack by a foreign nation on post-settlement Australia. In February 1942, about 240 Japanese aircraft conducted two raids on the city, killing at least 235 people and prompting half of the population to flee south.
Abe’s …
7 November 2018
Navigating China
Before December 2017, a visit by an Australian foreign minister to China was not usually a headline-grabbing event. But Marise Payne’s trip to Beijing today has attained symbolic status, capping off a so-called “thaw” in recent relations between the two countries.
Payne’s two-day visit follows Simon Birmingham’s trip to China on …
31 October 2018
Rising stakes in the Pacific
Following deadly riots in Tonga in 2006, the local government went looking for funds to rebuild its gutted capital, and found a willing low-interest lender: China. With Chinese money, Tonga not only rebuilt its city centre, but also renovated the royal palace and began work on a new sports complex and a waterfront government office building. These …
24 October 2018
A new neighbour
Australia could soon have a new country on its doorstep.
In June 2019, the people of Bougainville, a province that is part of Papua New Guinea, will vote in an independence referendum. Earlier this month, leaders from both sides finally agreed that the question to be put will be: “Do you agree for Bougainville to have: (1) Greater Autonomy …
17 October 2018
Cold War II?
Three years ago, a China expert in Washington, Michael Pillsbury, controversially predicted the date by which China secretly intends to take over the world: 2049, the hundredth anniversary of communist rule. Drawing on ancient Chinese history, his book The Hundred-Year Marathon argued that Beijing is applying 2500-year-old lessons of statecraft …
10 October 2018
North Korea rebrands
Last month, North Korea unveiled its latest series of propaganda posters, which, unlike some previous batches, contained no images of Donald Trump being attacked with an axe or Washington being destroyed by missiles.
Instead, the four brightly coloured posters promoted local production of steel and fabrics, as well as branded drinks, jams …
3 October 2018
The China – United States collision course
On Sunday, a US missile destroyer and a Chinese warship came within about 40 metres of colliding near a tiny set of Chinese-occupied reefs in the South China Sea. According to the United States, which revealed the incident on Tuesday, the USS Decatur was cruising close to the contested reefs when confronted by a Chinese destroyer that approached …
26 September 2018
The Japan–China thaw
Next month, for the first time since 2011, a Japanese leader will make an official visit to China. These two Asian giants have one of the world’s largest trading partnerships, yet their relationship is marked by historical tensions and petty snubs. Seven years ago, the trip to Beijing by former Japanese prime minister Yoshihiko Noda lasted just …
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