Last week China’s Victorian consul-general Long Zhou said:

“Australia should treat China and China’s development objectively and rationally, abandon ideological prejudices, and truly uphold the principles of mutual respect and equal treatment in handling bilateral relations and actively promote China-Australia relations to return to the track of normal and healthy development as soon as possible.”

In other words, do what China says, never question what China does, and all will return to normal.

No thanks Mr Zhou.

Respect is earned, not demanded, a fact your bosses back in Beijing clearly don’t understand.

As Professor of public ethics at Charles Sturt University, Clive Hamilton, said this is “boilerplate Communist Party language.”

“Last time I looked, bullying, subversion and economic coercion were not listed under ‘the principles of mutual respect and equal treatment.

“As for ‘the fundamental interests of the two peoples’, let’s hope one day soon the people of China can, like the people of Australia, breathe the fresh air of freedom.”

Senator Rex Patrick agreed.

“If he (Mr Zhou) was truly interested in principles of mutual respect and equal treatment, he could start by getting his own ministers to answer the phone when our ministers call,” he said.

“That would be a helpful first step, but I suspect he is just peddling propaganda under directions from his CCP masters.”

Professor Hamilton and Senator Patrick are bang on the money.

How can the CCP demand Australia “abandon ideological prejudices” and “uphold the principles of mutual respect” when it:

1. Launches a trade war with Australia affecting our coal, barley, wine, lobster, sugar and cotton industries in response to Scott Morrison’s call for an inquiry into the origins of COVID
2. Plans on building a military base 200 kilometres from our shores after militarising the South China Sea and claiming the surrounding gas and oil reserves
3. Lectures Australia on human rights and racism at the UN when it has millions of Uyghur Muslims in “re-education camps,” while continuing to oppress Tibetan and Falun Gong minorities
4. Imprisons young democrats in Hong Kong upset the CCP broke the “one country, two systems” deal which was to remain until 2047
5. Threatens Taiwan with war and forces companies like QANTAS to refer to the nation as a territory of the People’s Republic of China
6. Calls Australia “chewing gum stuck on the sole of China’s shoes” and labels our Prime Minister a “yes man to one (and) liar to all”
7. Suggests the attack on 21-year-old university student Drew Pavlou at the University of Queensland was “patriotic”
8. Brands our veterans as bloodthirsty child-killers and refuses to apologise for it, while calling our military a “lapdog of the US”
9. Spies on Chinese Australians and Chinese international students who refuse to grovel to CCP diktat
10. And calls the decision not to let Huawei participate in building Australia’s 5G network a form of discrimination

The hypocrisy, quite frankly, is mind-blowing, but unfortunately, utterly predictable.

As Greg Sheridan wrote in the Inquirer last weekend, a key “communist accomplishment” is “creating reality untethered from mere facts but in accordance with the party line.”

This is exactly what the CCP is trying to achieve in Australia.

They’ll play the victim while unashamedly bullying Australia.

They’ll play the race card when challenged on their hypocrisy.

And they’ll play dumb when criticised for their grotesque human rights abuses.

To skew the words of Mr Zhou a tad, perhaps China should:

Treat Australia and Australia’s development objectively and rationally, abandon ideological prejudices, and truly uphold the principles of mutual respect and equal treatment in handling bilateral relations and actively promote China-Australia relations to return to the track of normal and healthy development as soon as possible.

Then the CCP may have our respect.