London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Wednesday, Oct 01, 2025

US backs Chinese-language news site in Australia as battle of the narratives heats up

Decode China will operate under an arrangement with the US Department of State and the London-based Institute for War & Peace Reporting. The venture has been linked to critics of Beijing and comes amid tensions over Hong Kong, trade and claims of spying

A US government-backed media outlet is preparing to launch a Chinese-language news service in Australia, signalling a potential shake-up in the battle of narratives around China and its hotly debated influence in the country.

Decode China will operate a Chinese-language website under an arrangement with the US Department of State and the Institute for War & Peace Reporting (IWPR), according to disclosures on the Australian government’s public register of foreign influence.
The new media outlet was chosen as a “sub-awardee” of IWPR, a non-profit organisation that “works with the US Department of State to disseminate and manage grants around the world”, according to the disclosures.

The London-based charity describes its mission as to help journalists and civil society “speak out” through training, mentoring and other support programmes in “countries in conflict, crisis and transition around the world”.

In 2016, it received US$13.6 million in grants and donations from sources in the United States, Britain and the Netherlands, according to its annual report that year.

The venture comes at a time of heightened tensions between Canberra and Beijing, whose relations have been strained by a raft of disputes spanning issues including Hong Kong, trade, allegations of espionage, and racist incidents targeting Asians in Australia.

In the latest test of ties, Canberra on Thursday suspended its extradition treaty with Hong Kong and announced a pathway to permanent residency for Hongkongers as a response to the city’s controversial national security law, prompting a rebuke from Beijing for interfering in its “internal affairs”.

While Decode China’s mission, coverage focus and details such as launch date remain under wraps, prominent Chinese-Australians known for their criticism of Beijing have been linked to the project.

Corporate records identify Feng Chongyi, an associate professor at the University of Technology, Sydney, and Wai Ling Yeung, former head of Chinese Studies at Curtin University, as directors of Sydney-based Decode China Pty Ltd.

Feng, an Australian permanent resident born in Hainan, has written critically of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s leadership and Beijing’s influence over Chinese communities overseas.

In 2017, he was interrogated and prevented from leaving China for days while on a visit to the country. Yeung has sounded the alarm about Beijing “dominating the Chinese-language media”, and researched the activities of the United Front Work Department, which manages outreach to Chinese communities abroad, for the Jamestown Foundation, a Washington-based think tank.

Maree Ma, general manager of Chinese-language media group Vision Times, which has published articles critical of the Chinese Communist Party, is listed as secretary of the company.

Feng said he did not know when Decode China would launch or what his eventual involvement would be, as the project was in the planning stages. He declined to comment on the outlet’s goals or backers, citing a need to wait for official announcements.

Yeung, Ma and the IWPR did not respond to requests for comment.

The venture appears set to shake up a Chinese-language market seen by critics as too dominated by voices friendly towards Beijing.

Many of the biggest media groups – including Sydney-based Chinese Newspaper Group and Melbourne-headquartered Global CAMG Media Group – behind the dozens of websites, newspapers and broadcasters that cater to Australia’s estimated 600,000 Mandarin speakers are part-owned by Chinese state-owned media such as China Radio International.

A 2016 study by the Australia-China Relations Institute found Chinese-language media’s coverage of China over the past two decades had changed from being “mostly critical” to “representations that are sympathetic or even supportive”, alongside a shift in inward migration away from Hong Kong and Taiwan towards mainland China.

The study, carried out by University of Technology Sydney professor Wanning Sun, said “sensitive news” stories involving issues such as Tibet and the Falun Gong were often ignored and Chinese propaganda had “become to some extent integrated with Chinese media in Australia”.

“As most of them are commercial organisations, they respond to commercial pressures,” said Yun Jiang, a former Australian public servant who now serves as director of the China Policy Centre.

“So they have to consider how their viewers and advertisers would respond to their content. It is possible for the Chinese government to put pressure on advertisers in order to pressure the media companies.

“However, it is also possible that its attitude to the Chinese government reflects the audience of the readers, as the more recent migrants may have a more favourable view of Beijing than the earlier waves of migrants.”

Vicky Xu, an analyst with Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI), said the site could fill an “urgent demand for Chinese-language news outlets here that are capable of taking a critical position”.

“The site’s popularity will be dependent on how it’s run and which stories it chooses to cover,” said Xu, whose institute is part-funded by Australia’s Department of Defence, the US State Department and Britain’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office.
“But no doubt by the sound of it the outlet has much potential.”

Xu acknowledged the site would likely face questions about bias towards Washington, but drew a distinction between funding from US sources and money from Beijing, which she accused of not respecting “separation of power and the notion of checks and balances”.

However, Jon von Kowallis, a Chinese studies professor at the University of New South Wales Sydney, said the internet had already made a wide variety of information sources available to Chinese speakers in Australia.

“Chinese readers in Australia can and should consult a number of different sources and then make up their own minds what they think about what is going on in China and Australia,” von Kowallis said.

The emergence of Decode China also comes on the heels of the launch in October of APAC News, founded by businessman and consultant Marcus Reubenstein, which has attracted attention with coverage lauding the benefits of Chinese trade and investment and criticising Beijing’s critics.

APAC News, which is funded by reader subscriptions and says on its website it rejects all government advertising, also describes itself as a “strong advocate for a vitally important economic relationship and for 1.2 million people of Chinese heritage who’ve made Australia their home”.

The site, which publishes in English and Chinese, was positively cited last week by state-run China Daily during a Chinese Foreign Ministry media briefing after it published an article by former Sydney Morning Herald journalist Michael West detailing ASPI’s funding sources.

During the briefing, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian said ASPI, which regularly produces research critical of Beijing, had been “criticised by many, including those with vision in Australia, for what it has done”.

According to his LinkedIn profile, Reubenstein, a former television news producer who has travelled extensively in China, is the founder of consultancy Red Door Asia, billed as a facilitator of “business-to-business and business-to-people communication between China and Australasia”.

He is named as the author of a number of articles about Australia-China economic ties published by China’s state media, and has made several appearances on state-run China Global Television Network.

In an interview with CGTN in February, Sydney-based Reubenstein criticised Western media for its “negative tone” about China.
“I think one of the challenges for China – and certainly I see it constantly in mainstream media reporting on China in Australia – [is] reporting can’t separate the Chinese government, the Chinese economy, the Chinese trade situation, from the Chinese people. It’s regarded as this homogenous state,” he said.

Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
Trump Administration Launches “TrumpRx” Plan to Enable Direct Drug Sales at Deep Discounts
Trump Announces Intention to Impose 100 Percent Tariff on Foreign-Made Films
Altman Says GPT-5 Already Outpaces Him, Warns AI Could Automate 40% of Work
Singapore and Hong Kong Vie to Dominate Asia’s Rising Gold Trade
Trump Organization Teams with Saudi Developer on $1 Billion Trump Plaza in Jeddah
Manhattan Sees Surge in Office-to-Housing Conversions, Highest Since 2008
Switzerland and U.S. Issue Joint Assurance Against Currency Manipulation
Electronic Arts to Be Taken Private in Historic $55 Billion Buyout
Thomas Jacob Sanford Named as Suspect in Deadly Michigan Church Shooting and Arson
Russian Research Vessel 'Yantar' Tracked Mapping Europe’s Subsea Cables, Raising Security Alarms
New York Man Arrested After On-Air Confession to 2017 Parents’ Murders
U.S. Defense Chief Orders Sudden Summit of Hundreds of Generals and Admirals
Global Cruise Industry Posts Dramatic Comeback with 34.6 Million Passengers in 2024
Trump Claims FBI Planted 274 Agents at Capitol Riot, Citing Unverified Reports
India: Internet Suspended in Bareilly Amid Communal Clashes Between Muslims and Hindus
Supreme Court Extends Freeze on Nearly $5 Billion in U.S. Foreign Aid at Trump’s Request
Archaeologists Recover Statues and Temples from 2,000-Year-Old Sunken City off Alexandria
China Deploys 2,000 Workers to Spain to Build Major EV Battery Factory, Raising European Dependence
Speed Takes Over: How Drive-Through Coffee Chains Are Rewriting U.S. Coffee Culture
U.S. Demands Brussels Scrutinize Digital Rules to Prevent Bias Against American Tech
Ringo Starr Champions Enduring Beatles Legacy While Debuting Las Vegas Art Show
Private Equity’s Fundraising Surge Triggers Concern of European Market Shake-Out
Colombian President Petro Vows to Mobilize Volunteers for Gaza and Joins List of Fighters
FBI Removes Agents Who Kneeled at 2020 Protest, Citing Breach of Professional Conduct
Trump Alleges ‘Triple Sabotage’ at United Nations After Escalator and Teleprompter Failures
Shock in France: 5 Years in Prison for Former President Nicolas Sarkozy
Tokyo’s Jimbōchō Named World’s Coolest Neighbourhood for 2025
European Officials Fear Trump May Shift Blame for Ukraine War onto EU
BNP Paribas Abandons Ban on 'Controversial Weapons' Financing Amid Europe’s Defence Push
Typhoon Ragasa Leaves Trail of Destruction Across East Asia Before Making Landfall in China
The Personality Rights Challenge in India’s AI Era
Big Banks Rebuild in Hong Kong as Deal Volume Surges
Italy Considers Freezing Retirement Age at 67 to Avert Scheduled Hike
Italian City to Impose Tax on Visiting Dogs Starting in 2026
Arnault Denounces Proposed Wealth Tax as Threat to French Economy
Study Finds No Safe Level of Alcohol for Dementia Risk
Denmark Investigates Drone Incursion, Does Not Rule Out Russian Involvement
Lilly CEO Warns UK Is ‘Worst Country in Europe’ for Drug Prices, Pulls Back Investment
Nigel Farage Emerges as Central Force in British Politics with Reform UK Surge
Disney Reinstates ‘Jimmy Kimmel Live!’ after Six-Day Suspension over Charlie Kirk Comments
U.S. Prosecutors Move to Break Up Google’s Advertising Monopoly
Nvidia Pledges Up to $100 Billion Investment in OpenAI to Power Massive AI Data Center Build-Out
U.S. Signals ‘Large and Forceful’ Support for Argentina Amid Market Turmoil
Nvidia and Abu Dhabi’s TII Launch First AI-&-Robotics Lab in the Middle East
Vietnam Faces Up to $25 Billion Export Loss as U.S. Tariffs Bite
Europe Signals Stronger Support for Taiwan at Major Taipei Defence Show
Indonesia Court Upholds Military Law Amid Concerns Over Expanded Civilian Role
Larry Ellison, Michael Dell and Rupert Murdoch Join Trump-Backed Bid to Take Over TikTok
Trump and Musk Reunite Publicly for First Time Since Fallout at Kirk Memorial
Vietnam Closes 86 Million Untouched Bank Accounts Over Biometric ID Rules
×