WELLINGTON, New Zealand — This week, as New Zealanders worried about rising tensions with China, a Chinese state newspaper published an opinion piece by a former prime minister of New Zealand, apparently hailing China’s achievements. “We need to learn to listen to China,” the headline read.

There was one problem with the article: Jenny Shipley, the former leader named in the byline, was not its author.

The publication on Monday of the op-ed piece in People’s Daily, an official government newspaper, makes Mrs. Shipley the latest prominent foreigner to have been presented in the Chinese state news media as being supportive of the Communist Party’s policies at a time that suits Beijing’s purposes. This and other examples of foreign scholars and journalists depicted as offering glowing praise about China are part of a propaganda effort in recent years to lend credibility to the party’s talking points.

In the op-ed attributed to Mrs. Shipley, she appeared to hail China’s progress on the education, employment and development of women and on reducing poverty. It also said that China’s Belt and Road Initiative — a major geopolitical campaign by President Xi Jinping to link Asia with more bridges, trains and ports — was “one of the greatest ideas we’ve ever heard globally.”