The second Trump administration’s poor treatment of US allies and global institutions is providing “an opportunity” for China’s president, former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said, adding that Canberra needed to try to adopt a more independent defense policy as Washington grows more unreliable.
Turnbull, who led Australia from 2015 until 2018, said the world is seeing a more “undiluted” version of Donald Trump in his second term in office, and that his behavior would be viewed as an “advantage” for China’s President Xi Jinping in international relations over the next four years.
“President Xi will aim to be the exact opposite of Trump,” Turnbull said in an interview with Bloomberg Television in Sydney on Monday. “Where Trump is chaotic, he will be consistent. Where Trump is rude and abusive, he’ll be respectful. Where Trump is erratic, he will be consistent.”
Through that approach, Turnbull said there would be countries that look at “China on the one hand, and Trump on the other” and would “find China a more attractive partner.”
Turnbull was prime minister of Australia for part of Trump’s first term in office, and had a sometimes fractious relationship with the US president at the time.
Posting to his TruthSocial platform shortly after the interview, Trump said that Turnbull “never understood what was going on in China, nor did he have the capacity to do so.”
“I always thought he was a weak and ineffective leader and, obviously, Australian’s agreed with me,” Trump said.
This article was generated from an automated news agency feed without modifications to text.
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