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SYDNEY: Chinese social media platform WeChat blocked a message from Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison amid a dispute between Canberra and Beijing over the altered tweeted image of an Australian soldier.
China rejected Morrison’s requests for an apology after his Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian posted a photo of an Australian soldier holding a bloody knife to the throat of an Afghan boy on Monday (November 30).
The United States called China’s use of the digitally manipulated image a “new low” in disinformation.
Morrison took to WeChat on Tuesday to criticize the “false image”, while praising Australia’s Chinese community.
In his message, Morrison defended Australia’s handling of a war crimes investigation into the actions of special forces in Afghanistan, and said Australia would deal with “thorny issues” in a transparent manner.
But that message appeared to be blocked on Wednesday evening, and a note appeared from the “Weixin Official Account Platform Operations Center” saying that the content could not be viewed because it violated regulations, including distorting historical events. and confuse the public.
Tencent, WeChat’s parent company, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
READ: Shame and vindication as Australia digests report on Afghan military killings
Australian special forces reportedly killed 39 unarmed prisoners and civilians in Afghanistan, and senior commandos allegedly forced young soldiers to kill defenseless captives to “blood” them for combat, according to a four-year investigation.
Australia said last week that 19 soldiers and former soldiers would be referred for possible criminal prosecution.
The Chinese embassy has said the “rage and roar” from Australian politicians and media at the soldier’s image was an overreaction.
“HYPOCRISY IS OBVIOUS TO EVERYONE”
Australia sought “to divert public attention from the horrific atrocities committed by certain Australian soldiers,” he said.
Other nations, including the United States, New Zealand and France, and the autonomous island of Taiwan, which China claims as its own, have raised concerns about the use of the manipulated image by the Chinese Foreign Ministry in an official Twitter account. .
“The CCP’s latest attack on Australia is another example of its uncontrolled use of disinformation and coercive diplomacy. Its hypocrisy is obvious to all,” the US State Department said on Wednesday, referring to the Communist Party of China.
State Department deputy spokesman Cale Brown said the fabricated image of the soldier was “a new low, even for the Chinese Communist Party.”
“As the CCP spreads disinformation, it covers up its horrendous human rights abuses, including the detention of more than a million Muslims in Xinjiang,” Brown wrote in a tweet.
France’s foreign affairs spokesman said Tuesday that the tweeted image was “especially shocking” and Zhao’s comments “insulting to all countries whose armed forces are currently in Afghanistan.”
The Chinese embassy in Paris responded on Wednesday, saying the soldier’s image was a cartoon by a painter, adding that France has previously loudly defended the right to caricature.
WeChat has 690,000 daily active users in Australia, and in September it told an Australian government investigation that it would prevent foreign interference in Australian public debate through its platform.
Morrison’s message had been read by 57,000 WeChat users as of Wednesday.
Zhao’s tweet, pinned to the top of his Twitter account, had received “likes” from 60,000 followers, after Twitter labeled it as sensitive content but rejected Canberra’s request to remove the image.
READ: Twitter rejects call to remove fake tweet by Australian troops from Chinese official
Twitter is blocked in China, but has been used by Chinese diplomats.
China on Friday imposed anti-dumping duties of up to 200 percent on Australian wine imports, effectively shutting down the largest export market for the Australian wine industry.
A group of parliamentarians from 19 countries who have lobbied against China’s actions in Hong Kong, where it has cracked down on dissent, and in the western Xinjiang region, campaigned on social media for the public to drink Australian wine.
