A Chinese Communist Party watcher in Parliament tweeted 42000 times. Now he's been told to …

Geoff Wade’s Twitter feed was relentless.The researcher in Canberra’s federal parliamentary library has published more than 42,000 tweets full of links to news stories about China, especially the country’s ruling Communist Party, and photos of people at events Wade frequently claimed had links to CCP influence operations.The stoush has moved beyond the Australia-China Twitter community, bringing together concerns about CCP influence, free speech and Australia’s stifling defamation regime.Credit:BloombergDepending on who you ask, Wade’s feed is a trove of information for researchers, journalists and even MPs with concerns about China’s repression of democratic activists and minority ethnic groups at home, and increasingly assertive agenda abroad.But others see it as a scattershot list that, intentionally or not, casts suspicion on people for attending events such as Lunar New Year celebrations that may have only the vaguest, if any, links to the CCP.In February, Wade’s feed went quiet after his boss told him to take a pause following questions from journalist Marcus Reubenstein and a highly critical article on his little-known website, APAC News, about Wade’s social media use.LoadingThe article prompted James Paterson, the chairman of Parliament’s joint committee on intelligence and security, to warn foreign governments were targeting researchers critical of China.…
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