Australia's newly elected prime minister Kevin Rudd - better known as 'Lu Kewen' in this part of the world - is hailed by the Chinese media as an old 'China hand'.

His flawless Mandarin welcome for President Hu Jintao at September's Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) summit drew gasps and applause from the Chinese delegation, and now an expectant accolade pops up in Chinese news reports about him: The first Western head of government fluent in Putonghua.

Mr Rudd's sweep into Canberra after Saturday's general election raises hopes that he will serve as an empathetic broker between the West and China.

His love affair with the Chinese dates back to his teens, and promises to stretch into a second generation. The former Beijing-based diplomat graduated with a degree in Chinese language and history from the Australian National University.

Speaking mostly in Mandarin, Mr Rudd, 50, told Chinese state broadcaster CCTV in a recent interview that his three children are all learning the language. His older son, who has studied at the elite Fudan University in Shanghai, is memorising Chinese characters alongside reading law. His younger son is also working hard, though he is 'not very good yet'.

His daughter married an Australian Chinese from Hong Kong this year.

Derided by some as a show-off who is merely able to order Peking duck in Chinese restaurants, Mr Rudd's 'very good biao zhun putonghua (standard Mandarin)' impresses the diplomatic circuit and engages his Chinese constituents in his home state of Queensland, Professor Colin Mackerras of Griffith University in Australia told The Straits Times.

Prof Mackerras had chaired a task force Mr Rudd set up to spearhead a push for Asian languages to be taught in Australian schools in the mid-1990s.

With his longstanding interest in education, Mr Rudd, who was then working for the Queensland state government, was 'absolutely obsessed' with advocating the study of Mandarin, Indonesian, Japanese and Korean, Prof Mackerras said over the telephone from Brisbane.

'Kevin Rudd thought we should be taking more notice of Asia because we are in this region. He thought Australia was far too monocultural and did not pay nearly as much attention to Asia as we should,' he said.

Arriving in Beijing at the heady start of China's turn towards market economics, the young Mr Rudd worked at the Australian Embassy from 1984 to 1986.

He quickly established himself as the go-to man for journalists wanting sharp analysis on Chinese politics, and rose from second to first secretary during the posting.

It was then that he built a network of guanxi (connections), proving well-versed in the Chinese art of downing baijiu (white liquor) amid shouts of 'gan bei (bottoms up)', according to Australian press reports.

He was later a China consultant with accounting firm KPMG before returning to Australia in 1988 and becoming a Member of Parliament 10 years later. His Labor Party has long had ties with the Chinese Communist Party.

Analysts do not expect the nuts and bolts of Mr Rudd's Asia policy to be very different from those of outgoing Prime Minister John Howard, but the new premier is expected to stress the 'softer' aspects of building ties, especially with China.

Speaking at the influential Brookings Institution think-tank in Washington in April, Mr Rudd stressed the need to engage China while keeping East Asia firmly anchored in the US-led framework of regional alliances.

Australia's ties with China, its recently crowned No. 1 trade partner, are already quite close, said Professor David Zweig of the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.

If they also cosy up in military and strategic terms, it will put some distance between Canberra and Washington, he said.

simcy@sph.com.sg

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