SYDNEY — Australia is having to rethink its dealings with China following the bizarre jailing in Shanghai of an Australian businessman and a flurry of undercover diplomatic requests for explanations from Canberra to Beijing.
The much-hyped trade boom between China and Australia has taken a hit as Australian exporters of raw materials grapple with the perception gap between their way of doing international business and Beijing's much-broader linking of commercial business to national security.
Mistrust flowing from the so-called Rio spy case is making both veteran Australian diplomats and newly enlightened minerals shippers look back nostalgically over decades of mutually beneficial deals between Japanese steel mills and power plants and Australian suppliers of iron ore and coal.