Australia retains port lease by Chinese
Security risks to Landbridge’s 99-year lease of Darwin port have been allayed.
Daily TribuneSecurity risks to Landbridge’s 99-year lease of Darwin port have been allayed.
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Australia's government said Friday it had decided against cancelling a Chinese company's lease of the northern Port of Darwin after a review into its national security risks.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese's center-left government said it accepted the review's findings that the Chinese-owned Landbridge's 99-year lease of the port, granted in 2015, is subject to a "robust" regulatory system and "sufficient" ongoing monitoring of risks.
"Australians can have confidence that their safety will not be compromised, while ensuring that Australia remains a competitive destination for foreign investment," the department of the prime minister and cabinet said in a statement.
The northern Port of Darwin is the closest to Australia's Asian neighbors.
It will also be the base for a light, easy-to-deploy army brigade envisaged as part of a military shake-up to shift Australia's defense posture towards long-range deterrence.
Shortly after his Labor Party came to power in May 2022 elections, Albanese promised a review of Landbridge's lease, which had reportedly blindsided close ally the United States when it was granted under the then-conservative government.
The decision not to cancel the lease comes at a time of apparently easing tensions between Beijing and Canberra, with China's release this month of Australian journalist Cheng Lei from three years in detention, and its gradual relaxation of a series of punitive trade measures.
Australia-China relations had been in deep freeze after Canberra barred Chinese tech firm Huawei from lucrative contracts, pushed back against Chinese influence campaigns and joined calls for an investigation into the origins of the Covid-19 outbreak.
In retaliation, China introduced a swathe of de facto sanctions against Australian products, measures that have been slowly unwound as relations thaw under the Albanese government.
