Australia Treasurer Jim Chalmers on Wednesday urged Australians to be cautious when using Chinese AI model DeepSeek, the latest government to warn over its use.

The growth in export value was largely driven by a surge in shipments to mainland China, following the removal of tariffs on Australian bottled wine at the end of March last year.

SYDNEY – Australia’s Defence Minister Richard Marles said he has spoken of the importance of American leadership in the Indo-Pacific region in a “very warm” call with new US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth.

The lifting of trade tariffs by China triggered a surge in Australian wine exports last year, but it is unclear whether Chinese demand will remain strong after buyers have restocked, an industry body said on Wednesday.

Australia’s dilemma is that there is a tension in balancing the commercial advantages of cheaper Chinese technology with our national security interests.

The rising popularity of DeepSeek, a Chinese AI platform, has raised data privacy concerns. While Australia has asked users to be cautious, Italy’s Data Protection Agency has posed questions about how the chatbot uses personal data.

“The Chinese government firmly opposes any form of illegal migration,” she added. This comes after US President Donald Trump threatened to hit Colombia with tariffs of up to 50% as the latter refused to take back deported migrants.

DeepSeek, a Chinese AI startup that’s just over a year old, has stirred awe and consternation in Silicon Valley after demonstrating breakthrough artificial intelligence models that offer comparable performance to the world’s best chatbots at seemingly a fraction of the cost.

Representatives from the Western Australian government and fellow guests attended a reception in Perth on Jan 25 to celebrate Spring Festival.

Eyck Freymann is a Hoover Fellow at Stanford University and Nonresident Research Fellow with the China Maritime Studies Institute at the U.S. Naval War College. Hugo Bromley is an Applied History Research Fellow at the Center for Geopolitics at the University of Cambridge.

The resumption of lobster trade between China and Australia will not only further promote economic and trade ties between the two countries but will also contribute positively to both regional and global economies, said government officials and experts.

So much for the quiet pre-holiday trading session as Asian equities were mixed though Australia was closed for Australia Day, Indonesia was closed for Al Isra’ wal-Mi’raj, South Korea was closed for the Korean New Year,