Australia vows to ‘vigorously defend’ itself against China WTO complaint

Beijing has launched a formal challenge against Australian tariffs on several Chinese products in the latest escalation of the dispute between the two countries.

The Chinese government’s decision to take action through the World Trade Organization follows Australia’s own twin challenges against Beijing’s imposition of tariffs on Australian barley and wine.

The Chinese commerce ministry announced late on Thursday that it would use WTO procedures to challenge Australia’s measures targeting railway wheels, wind towers, and stainless steel sink products from China.

Related: Australians have lost trust in Chinese government but don’t want to be dragged into war, poll finds

The Australian trade minister, Dan Tehan, said the government would “robustly defend the measures that we have put in place”.

Tehan questioned the timing of the move, saying Australia had introduced the measures on wind towers and stainless steel sinks in 2014 and 2015. The measure relating to railway wheels was more recent in 2019.

The minister attempted to strike a conciliatory note, saying Australian officials were ready to enter into discussions with their Chinese counterparts about the issue – but he hoped China would agree to discussions at the ministerial level, too.

China has blocked ministerial-level talks for at least the past year, amid a souring of the relationship over a range of issues including Australia’s early public calls for an international investigation into the Covid-19 origins and its criticism of China over the crackdown on dissent in Hong Kong and human rights abuses in Xinjiang.

Over the past year, Beijing has rolled out tariffs and other trade actions against Australian export sectors including barley, wine, seafood and coal, and has argued the Australian government “bears full responsibility” for the breakdown in the relationship.

The Australian government maintains that it wants a return to high-level talks, but says it is not prepared to “trade away” its values or sovereignty.

“What we want to do is see very constructive engagement with China,” Tehan said. “We want to sit down and work through these disputes. We continue to do that at the official level and we would be most happy to do it at the ministerial level.”

China’s commerce ministry said it opposed “the abuse of measures” and would safeguard “the legitimate rights and interests of Chinese companies”.

The ministry called on Australia to take concrete steps to return trade to “a normal track”, according to the Chinese state-run Global Times newspaper.

Tehan acknowledged that China had “the right to take this action” but said it had not yet set out the grounds of the challenge. He said Australia was notified about the move shortly after 5pm on Thursday.

He said WTO cases could take anywhere between two to four years to be resolved in the event the parties did not reach a breakthrough in initial talks.

Tehan refused to rule out the possibility of Australia making WTO referrals over other affected Australian export sectors - but said such options would only be considered “where we think that we had a strong legal case and where we think serious injury or damage has been done to industry here”.

While the trade dispute continues to play out, the Morrison government is facing calls from some backbenchers to boycott the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing in protest at human rights abuses.

Speaking to the ABC on Thursday, the conservative government backbencher Eric Abetz described the Chinese Communist party as a “brutal dictatorship” and drew parallels with Nazi Germany.

The departing head of Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Frances Adamson, said the Chinese government had developed a “siege mentality” which was fuelling “a steep loss of influence in Australia and many other countries”.

Adamson, who is also a former ambassador to Beijing, told the National Press Club this week that China was “still dogged by insecurity as much as driven by ambition” and was too ready to suspect other countries of trying to contain it.

A Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson, Zhao Lijian, said Adamson’s comments “couldn’t be further from the fact”.