Speaker 1: You can listen to the Front on your smart speaker
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Speaker 1: the news from the Australian. From the Australian, here's what's
Speaker 1: on the Front. I'm Kristinamot. It's Monday, August twenty six.
Speaker 1: Blackouts and big power bills could be our new reality
Speaker 1: as gas supplies dropped to critically low levels and coal
Speaker 1: fired power plants limp into retirement, But neither the government
Speaker 1: nor the Energy market regulator have provided the industry with
Speaker 1: updates for how they're planning to fix the problem. That
Speaker 1: stories live right now at the Australian dot com dot au.
Speaker 1: The Israeli Defense Force launched a preemptive strike on Hesbola
Speaker 1: targets in Lebanon on Sunday. It says the onehundred rockets
Speaker 1: were designed to deter a large scale attack, but members
Speaker 1: of the Lebanese group said they carried out a raid
Speaker 1: of their own in retaliation for the death of a
Speaker 1: top commander. Australia's ambassador to China will join four hundred
Speaker 1: other guests, including diplomats from our Five Eyes partners, at
Speaker 1: a black tie ball on the Great Wall of China
Speaker 1: in a fortnight. That's the latest from Will Glasgow, the
Speaker 1: Australian's North Asia correspondent and the first Australian journalist invited
Speaker 1: back to Beijing. In today's episode A Correspondent's Long and
Speaker 1: Winding Road back to China.
Speaker 2: My way overordered was delicious, but I did not need
Speaker 2: that well beef noodle suit, not with the cucumber garlic
Speaker 2: dish and the spinach peanut dish and the beef coomin skewer.
Speaker 1: That's The Australian's North Asia correspondent Will Glasgow. He's back
Speaker 1: in his old stomping ground, Beijing's Donjamen district for the
Speaker 1: first time in four years.
Speaker 2: I got to work on my portion sizes.
Speaker 3: I got to adjust.
Speaker 1: Donjamen is one of Beijing's more expat friendly neighborhoods, with
Speaker 1: journalists like Will as well as diplomats and business people
Speaker 1: historically calling it home. These days, it's buzzing with locals
Speaker 1: and domestic travelers out to see the sites. It's summer
Speaker 1: in Beijing and the sky is a clear, glittering blue.
Speaker 1: Will was invited to return to Beijing by the Chinese government,
Speaker 1: and so with Camber's blessing, he set off.
Speaker 4: So my passport's over with the Exit and Entry Immigration
Speaker 4: Office of the Public Security Bureau, and as long as
Speaker 4: I get the green light from then I've got a
Speaker 4: residency permit to allow me to be a foreign journalist
Speaker 4: to China for the next year.
Speaker 1: Last week, Will became the first Australian journalists to be
Speaker 1: granted media credentials since twenty twenty. Will had been living
Speaker 1: and working in China for six months when in twenty
Speaker 1: twenty he returned to Australia to get his wife. The
Speaker 1: COVID nineteen pandemic, which originated in China, was gathering steam
Speaker 1: and things were getting tense. They had an exemption to
Speaker 1: return to China after a stint in hotel quarantine, but
Speaker 1: Will was advised against boarding his return flight by Australian
Speaker 1: officials shortly before they were due to depart. Will's been
Speaker 1: living in Taipei since twenty twenty one. Will was one
Speaker 1: of dozens of foreign journalists who left China in twenty twenty.
Speaker 1: Some departures were voluntary, but most were ordered out.
Speaker 5: China has defended its decision to expel more than a
Speaker 5: dozen American journalists and also bar them from working in
Speaker 5: Hong Kong. Beijing says that it is within its rights
Speaker 5: and has threatened further action. This latest diplomatic row was
Speaker 5: triggered last month when Washington forced Chinese state media outlets
Speaker 5: to register as foreign embassies.
Speaker 1: Australia's relationship with the People's Republic was on the rocks too.
Speaker 1: The Government of the day, led by Scott Morrison, back
Speaker 1: to an international inquiry into the origins of the pandemic,
Speaker 1: a move that didn't go down well with the Chinese
Speaker 1: Communist Party. Will A lot has happened in the last
Speaker 1: four years. Has any of that been on your mind
Speaker 1: as you've made this return to Beijing? Are you scared?
Speaker 3: I'm not scared. I'm not scared, but it is on
Speaker 3: my mind of course, right. I mean, I didn't just
Speaker 3: get a letter from the Chinese government and then book
Speaker 3: a ticket and fly over here. I think listeners will
Speaker 3: be amazed at how long this process has gone on for.
Speaker 3: I mean I've literally been back and forth conversations with
Speaker 3: the Chinese in a quite a focused way on whether
Speaker 3: this was possible or not for more than eighteen months.
Speaker 3: Foreign reporters, we have a lot of hurdles for how
Speaker 3: we do things, like one getting access to the internet,
Speaker 3: like everyone in China has that problem because of the
Speaker 3: great firewall that's got worse.
Speaker 2: Right, that's just.
Speaker 3: A simple one that frustrates every day that you're trying
Speaker 3: to do your job here. But we have the problem
Speaker 3: of getting people to speak to us, right because of
Speaker 3: the propaganda machine that demonizes as foreign media and has
Speaker 3: created such suspicion and nervousness amongst Chinese people here, and
Speaker 3: amongst Chinese experts, and even amongst Chinese government officials, who
Speaker 3: for the most part decline interview requests from foreign media
Speaker 3: because they just see it as too risky. And one
Speaker 3: of the big challenges for Australian media as we come
Speaker 3: back to China is navigating that extreme distrust that our
Speaker 3: readers have about this place because of so much of
Speaker 3: the things that have happened over the last four years.
Speaker 1: You know, you've been running around all over town having
Speaker 1: meetings and chatting with Chinese officials since you got back.
Speaker 1: How has your arrival been received this time around? Are
Speaker 1: you finding you having to tread more carefully the.
Speaker 3: Various meanings I've had there's sort of different times. Some
Speaker 3: are quite kurt and brief affairs, others are much more
Speaker 3: expansive and much more of a back and forth. And
Speaker 3: one of the real striking takeaways is they're very aware
Speaker 3: that I am the first Australian journalist from Australian media
Speaker 3: returning here. They're very aware of that, right, and so
Speaker 3: there's a bit of attempts by them to flatter me
Speaker 3: for that, you know, and impress on me what a
Speaker 3: great opportunity is and impress on me my role as
Speaker 3: a bridge builder between Australia and China. And look, I
Speaker 3: just repeat to them what my job is, which is
Speaker 3: to serve my readers, and that's what I'm here for.
Speaker 3: My job's to do my job as best I can
Speaker 3: and as accurately tell the story about China right now
Speaker 3: what it means for Australia. But it's clear there's a
Speaker 3: desire to impress on me that I'd wanted here, that
Speaker 3: I'm going to be safe. The return is being welcomed
Speaker 3: by bits of the Chinese system that said I wouldn't
Speaker 3: over do it, right, I mean, you can see the
Speaker 3: very opposite, and I've experienced the very opposite. There's definitely
Speaker 3: parts of the Chinese system that would much rather I
Speaker 3: wasn't here right. They think that having no Australian journalists
Speaker 3: in China was a pretty wonderful situation and long may
Speaker 3: that have lasted, right, And so there's nervousness from bits
Speaker 3: of definitely well nervousness and perhaps a bit of grumbling
Speaker 3: about the return of on Australian journalists and from those
Speaker 3: parts of the Chinese state there are concerns that you know,
Speaker 3: am I the first of a number. I mean, we'll
Speaker 3: find out.
Speaker 1: Right coming up what's happening below the surface of Beijing's
Speaker 1: impressive facelift. We'll be back after the break.
Speaker 2: Out for a.
Speaker 4: Stroll along the Liangma River, which when I live Tea
Speaker 4: back in twenty twenty was well was it dump? I
Speaker 4: mean quite literally it was just full of rubbish. It
Speaker 4: was disgusting. It was building works all along it.
Speaker 1: The Beijing will Glasgow has returned to after four years
Speaker 1: in Taipei is a different city to the one he left.
Speaker 1: That's because it's had a pretty major facelift in places.
Speaker 4: Well, it turns out they were building a greenway park
Speaker 4: that runs all the way along the river to chow
Speaker 4: Young Park links it up and it's I have to admit,
Speaker 4: it's really beautiful. It's really popular. It's full of walkers
Speaker 4: and people fishing, and I can see up ahead people
Speaker 4: kayaking and even some people swimming, which if you tell
Speaker 4: me four years ago people would swim in this thing,
Speaker 4: I would have just well, I would have been horrified, frankly,
Speaker 4: and be worried about their health. But people look pretty
Speaker 4: happy doing it.
Speaker 1: Will's a dedicated runner, and he's enjoying running along the
Speaker 1: river in his old neighborhood without a mask designed to
Speaker 1: protect him from Beijing's notorious air pollution. Nowadays, the city,
Speaker 1: once dubbed airport sometimes boast air quality almost as good
Speaker 1: as Sydney. The sky has been clear and bright, with
Speaker 1: heavy summer storms washing away the last remnants of pollution.
Speaker 1: In Beijing's the glitzy chaw Young district, the once famous
Speaker 1: Opposite House boutique hotel sits vacant. Its doors were closed
Speaker 1: just last month, a symbol of the economic uncertainty bubbling
Speaker 1: just under the surface of this gussied up city.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's a funny thing. In whats of ways, Beijing
Speaker 3: looks wealthier than it was when I left, right, I mean,
Speaker 3: maybe it's just so long out of the country and
Speaker 3: just the jarring sight of seeing cashed up Beijing is
Speaker 3: out in posh shopping centers and sandy turned buying lots
Speaker 3: of stuff. It's just a very visual reminder that there
Speaker 3: is a lot of money still being spent in the
Speaker 3: Chinese economy. That's real, right, But Beijing is not representative
Speaker 3: of much of China at all.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 3: It's a very wealthy, privileged part of this warness country.
Speaker 3: And Stanleyton is a really unrepresentative part of Beijing. So
Speaker 3: you know, you have to just remember most Chinese aren't
Speaker 3: living lives anything like that. But you know, we're still
Speaker 3: talking about five percent growth, so it's not nothing. And
Speaker 3: across the Chinese economy you see this price war. It's
Speaker 3: even in dentists in Beijing, where customers are negotiating down
Speaker 3: what they'll pay to get a tooth filling. It's happened
Speaker 3: to me in my own experience here at the gym,
Speaker 3: and just across the Chinese economy, people are arguing prices
Speaker 3: down and there's actually deflation in the Chinese economy, not inflation.
Speaker 3: Prices are going down here. So there's a really weird
Speaker 3: mismatch in this moment of the Chinese economy between its
Speaker 3: headline economic numbers which have helped Australian exporters, and we
Speaker 3: continue the Australian economy continues to make a lot of
Speaker 3: money from There's a big gap with how people in
Speaker 3: China are feeling, and you just talk to people here
Speaker 3: and they're doing it tough. A lot of people are
Speaker 3: finding things pretty grim and they're very concerned about the
Speaker 3: outlook here. The Chinese government knows about the problems. They're
Speaker 3: taking them very seriously and trying to fix them. But
Speaker 3: we just don't know if they're going to be successful
Speaker 3: or not. But we do know that it's going to
Speaker 3: have an enormous impact on Australia. Whether they're successful or
Speaker 3: they're not successful, or they kind of muddle through. Either way,
Speaker 3: we're going to feel it back in Australia.
Speaker 1: Book Glasgow is The Australian's North Asia correspondent. You can
Speaker 1: read all about his longer way to return to Beijing
Speaker 1: and see pictures and videos of the city four years
Speaker 1: on right now at the Australian dot com dot au