A group of Australian journalists has been blocked from travelling to China because of “frosty” diplomatic relations between the two countries.
The reporters have been denied visas to travel this week. Between five and eight journalists, including veteran political reporter Paul Bongiorno, had been due to leave for China on Thursday with Bob Carr’s Australia China Relations Institute.
Each year the institute takes a delegation of journalists on a China trip. Carr told ABC radio on Tuesday that after speaking to China’s ambassador to Australia, Cheng Jingye, last week he had discovered that the visas were being blocked because of “frosty” diplomatic relations between the two countries.