Editor’s note for Monday, November 30, 2020

My thoughts today:

It’s been a rough month for Australia-China relations. Some highlights:

• November 2: Beijing continues to punish Australia
• November 18: The 14 sins of Australia: Beijing expands list of grievances and digs in for extended diplomatic dispute
• November 27: Australian wine and coal fall victim to souring of ties with China

Things have got worse, once again. Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison has demanded the Chinese government delete a “repugnant” and “falsified image” tweeted this morning by famously aggressive Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhào Lìjiān 赵立坚 that depicts an Australian soldier threatening to slit a child’s throat. (Context: The artist who made the image is known as a “wolf-warrior artist”; last week Friday, Zhao went on a tirade about the Australian army during the Foreign Ministry briefing.)

Zhao’s senior colleague Huà Chūnyíng 华春莹 defended his tweet today at a Foreign Ministry briefing:

The Australian side has been reacting so strongly to my colleague’s tweet. Why is that? Do they think that their merciless killing of Afghan civilians is justified but the condemnation of such ruthless brutality is not? Afghan lives matter!

If I owned an Australian barley farm, vineyard, or coal mine, I’d be spending a lot of time in countries other than China looking for new markets.

Our word of the day is the virus broke out at multiple locations worldwide (病毒是在全球范围内多点、多地暴发 bìngdú shì zài quánqiú fànwéi nèi duō diǎn, duō dì bàofā), which is what a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson said today of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19.

Upcoming events:

• Tomorrow, December 1: A film screening of the documentary Finding Ying Ying, and a webinar with the producer and director of the film.
• Also tomorrow: The podcasters behind The China Project network show Tech Buzz China have a live session on the major livestreaming ecommerce players and emerging consumer brands.
• December 3: Learn how to make spicy, tingling Chongqing noodles with an up-and-coming startup entrepreneur in the Chinese condiment food space, Yao Zhao.

—Jeremy Goldkorn, Editor-in-Chief