Tuesday, May 04, 2021

Global Times: China-Australia war of words continues with CCP mouthpiece publication

Kissinger warns of ‘colossal’ dangers in US-China tensions France 24


China’s mouthpiece has issued a fresh attack on Australia with the publication of a propaganda poster that takes aim at our troops.

The Global Times newspaper, which officially has the backing of the Chinese Communist Party, produced a poster that details alleged war crimes carried out in Afghanistan.



The poster, published under the headline ‘Troops are leaving, will justice arrive soon?’, comes as Australia prepares to pull out of Afghanistan as its allies including the United States do the same.

China-Australia war of words continues with CCP mouthpiece publication 


In a speech to special forces soldiers last year, Major-General Adam Findlay told his troops they must prepare for the high likelihood of conflict with China.

Major-General Findlay, who was the commander of the special forces at the time but has since stepped down, said China was already engaged in grey zone conflict, or conflict that occurs in the area between war and peace.

Grey zone conflict and the drums of war as tensions between Australia and China escalate



How Not to Win Allies and Influence Geopolitics Foreign Affairs


New immigration bill sparks fears of Hong Kong ‘exit ban’ Al Jazeera


‘Blind box’ craze grips China’s youth and mints toymakers a fortune Channel News Asia



Insightful quote for strange times as the drums of war are beating 


“Art is often seen as icing on the cake, something to distract people, the spectacle part of bread and circuses.  But it is really a place for dissent, analysis, confrontation, celebration, rapture, learning.  A place where you can do dangerous things but not be in danger, where you can be controversial and be listened to without fear of reprisal (in some countries anyway), where you can hypothesise, generalise, be specific, light, heavy, oblique, critical, precise, angry, examine the past or the future, go out on a limb and fall off, fail, fail again, stay there, or get up and keep going. Art is continually reinvented and that is why it has so much value.  You can’t pin it down and tear off its wings.  Or if you do they grow back.

[…]

There is art history, there is art theory, there is art criticism but there are also much larger stories about art that involve its vital place in our lives, for confrontation, healing, growing, enriching and expanding.  There is liberation theology, perhaps too there is liberation art for freedom and justice.

[…]

art and culture are too important to everyone to be swallowed up by the marketplace.”



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