Tony Kevin
Tony Kevin is a former Australian ambassador to Poland and Cambodia, and a member of the Emeritus Faculty at Australian National University. The author of Return to Moscow (2017), he has independently visited Russia six times since 2016. He has delivered lectures and taken part in academic conferences in the Moscow Diplomatic Academy and in Saint Petersburg on the outlook for Russia-Australia relations.
Tony Kevin is a former Australian ambassador to Poland and Cambodia, and a member of the Emeritus Faculty at Australian National University. The author of Return to Moscow (2017), he has independently visited Russia six times since 2016. He has delivered lectures and taken part in academic conferences in the Moscow Diplomatic Academy and in Saint Petersburg on the outlook for Russia-Australia relations.
Tony's recent articles
26 February 2025
What the Bankstown Hospital nurses’ affair teaches us
Like heated milk boiling over in a saucepan, the sad Bankstown Public Hospital nurses’ affair has brought to a public head a long-simmering debate, rarely mentioned in polite company, about the extent and legitimacy of Zionist Israel’s interference in Australian political and public life and in our most vital community institutions like national broadcasters or health systems . This is a debate, however awkward, that Australia needs to have.
13 January 2025
Ukraine war: President Trump confronts a decision
In less than two weeks, when Donald Trump takes office, he will confront sharply conflicting advice on Ukraine from pro-war and anti-war camps in his incoming administration. We cannot predict the outcome, but here is relevant analysis of the choices facing him.
7 November 2024
Are Australian public servants condemned to be silent members of society?
A recent timely 4 November article in the ‘Canberra Times’ by John Wilson and Kieran Pender, “If public servants are made ‘silent members of society’ , democracy is worse for it”, highlights growing problems in interpreting and administering the protocols governing public political comment by Australian public servants.
12 March 2024
Gazas agony: the hinge point in the loss of Western dominance
The scale of deliberate Israeli cruelty against the Gazan people over the past five months is still difficult for Australians to absorb. But internationally, akey political fact has clearly emerged: that Israel, the US and their supportive Western allies (like Australia, to our nations shame) have now shredded any moral standing on the issue of the war in Gaza.
29 January 2024
On the precipice: The US pushes allies towards a Middle East war
Netanyahu and his supporters in Washington are playing for very high and dangerous stakes indeed as the Middle East war threatens to widen beyond Gaza.
11 January 2024
Amidst preparations for long Ukraine war, peace may come quickly
It is possible now that peace could come to Ukraine rather faster than most Western analysts are predicting, but this will only be only on terms acceptable to Russia.
5 December 2023
Russia has learned not to trustAmericasfalsepeace overtures
Western capitalsnowopenlyacknowledge the reality that their proxy war in Ukrainehasrun out ofsteam.Desperatenew policydirectionsare beingdiscussedin NATO circles. But a decision to end the war will be taken only byMoscow.
8 August 2023
Our minerals are ripe for the plucking by the US
US-driven fast-track negotiations to develop secure strategic critical minerals supply chains from Australia risk jeopardising our mining industry links with China, and locking down our own industrial development based on our critical minerals.
29 April 2023
Seymour Hershs second strike
Hershs latest revelations on 12 April 2023 in his self-published Substack blog, Trading with the Enemy,detail, among other Ukrainian corruption scandals now widely known in Washington military and intelligence circles, the Zelensky regimes embezzlement of $400 million from US military aid to Ukraine.
4 March 2023
Chinas peace plan for Ukraine
Recent Chinese Government peace proposals offer new hope for political settlement of the Ukraine crisis.
26 August 2022
Could Trump become US President again in 2024?
However unpalatable the thought, It is time to start getting our heads around the fact that Trump may stand and may well regain the US presidency in November 2024.
31 January 2022
There's still time for talk over Ukraine, but Western minds remain closed
Anti-Russian stereotypes again dominate the discourse. Western information warriors believe they have manouevred Russia into a no-win situation.
6 January 2022
Last Chance Saloon: best chance to ease East-West tensions cannot be missed
We are at a crunch point now in Russia-US relations. Their high-level talks starting next week will be closely observed by China, Russias de facto strategic ally. The coming days and weeks will determine the shape of world security for decades to come.
19 December 2021
Russia and China sit together to watch the decline of the West
The main global game now is Russia-China relations: the ability of the United States to control or influence the world order is fading fast.
24 November 2021
Balancing diplomacy and direct action in 'Magnitsky Act' sanctions
Sponsored by a Labor senator and finessed by DFAT, a bill for a Magnitsky Act to sanction human rights abuses is poised to be tabled in Parliament.
30 September 2021
With a statesmanlike press club speech, is Turnbull on his way back into politics?
Former prime minister Malcolm Turnbulls online National Press Club address was extraordinarily good and could yet have significant political consequences.
23 September 2021
Melbourne riots shake public trust in reliability of mainstream media
There is strong evidence that Melbournes four days of street riots by angry young men claiming to be construction workers were fomented by right-wing extremists who used social media to radicalise unemployed or locked-down young men. They look to have modelled themselves on Trump supporters storming the Capitol.
19 September 2021
Russian Duma elections mark a watershed moment in Russia-West relations
Russia, confident that it has seen off major US challenges to its sovereign independence, looks forward to its growing world role following significant elections on Sunday.
17 August 2021
The US disaster in Afghanistan and the growing influence of Russia and China
Afghanistans economic and social reconstruction could be swift, provided it is not handicapped by continuing Western interventions.
29 July 2021
Gareth Evans rubbishes the Foreign Influence Transparency Scheme: Loyal and Patriotic Australians should follow his lead.
Gareth Evans robust public rejection of a suggestion from Attorney-Generals Department that he should consider whether he has registration obligations under the Foreign Influence Transparency Scheme (i.e., should register himself as an agent of foreign influence) is highly commended.
21 June 2021
Putin and Biden reshuffle the deck
The 16 June Geneva Summit had positive outcomes. In a rare moment of joint statesmanship, Presidents Biden and Putin reshuffled the deck of Russia-US relations. Where the new card game may go is uncertain: but Geneva offers present hope for a safer and more rational relationship between the worlds strongest nuclear weapon powers.
20 April 2021
A precarious time in US-Russian relations
Things could soon improve, or they could get very much worse. There are conflicting policy indications from both sides.
15 March 2021
Ignorance and Prejudice on China is now entrenched in Australian media - Part 2
With a mainstream media climate like this on China and dissenting voices being discouraged, it is hard to see any early prospect of easing tensions. The Australian people have been badly let down on China by our policy elites.
14 March 2021
'Ignorance and prejudice on China are now entrenched in Australian media'. Part 1
Ignorance and prejudice on China are now entrenched in Australia, fed by media repetition of false narratives; possibly encouraged by US and UK origin foreign influences; and enabled by stubborn and inept Australian political leadership.
11 February 2021
Morrison can barely hide his disdain for China; Labor fears being wedged
Until there is more positive signalling out of Washington, the AustraliaChina relationship will remain frozen. Neither Morrison nor Albanese has the grace, courage, or diplomatic skills to challenge the status quo.
5 December 2020
How Australia sabotaged its own interests in relations with China.
The destruction over the past five years of Australias mutually beneficial diplomatic and trade relationship with China was probably a successful Five Eyes information warfare operation, facilitated by the Australian political classs own foolish arrogance and ignorance towards China. Australia is now back in the laager, an American strategic satellite and odd man out in the Asia-Pacific region and with a weakened economy.
30 November 2020
Natasha Kassam and the AFR have it wrong on China-Australia tensions
Australia is fast becoming a sad joke, an object lesson in how not to behave towards China. If we are becoming an example, it is an example of what to avoid.
10 November 2020
Scott Morrisons ambit claims on US President-elect Biden unlikely to have much impact
At a time when Australia needs to work to rebuild past diplomatic friendships with the US and China, Canberra seems to be going out of its way to further irritate both countries. It is Australian state-level diplomacy at its most ham-fisted.
14 September 2020
What lies behind last weeks sharp increase in Australia-China tensions? ABC's Bill Birtles was NOT "expelled" from China
The latest deterioration in Australia-China relations appears to have been provoked by Australian national security agencies and their supporters, in a strategy aimed at souring Chinese-Australian media relations.
26 July 2020
The war against China is largely facilitated by propaganda.
We are indeed now in the thick of a Third World War. It has been started by US and UK, aided by minor Five Eyes allies Canada and Australia. They have chosen their preferred strategic fighting terrain - information warfare
17 July 2018
Trump-Putin Summit 16 July: an assessment
This was a most unusual summit, preceded and followed by a torrent of mostly negative Western MSM comment on the theme that Putin will win this, and Western interests will lose.
27 November 2016
The Global Strategic Landscape present realities, and prospects under Trump. Quo vadis series.
Quo vadis - Australian foreign policy and ANZUS. Australia should call on all the nuclear weapon states in particular, the two major arsenal-holders US and Russia - to return to the prudent protocols and courtesies of classical great power diplomacy, within the protocols and disciplines of the UN Security Council system of global collective security.