A former Chinese diplomat who was granted a permanent protection visa in Australia has warned the country is 'turning red'.

Yonglin Chen, who risked his life to defect from the Chinese Consulate in Sydney in 2005, said Chinese government influence is growing stronger in Australia.

Mr Chen claims he was the target of a planned assassination attempt after his defection, and said if he is too vocal he and his family could be in danger again.

Scroll down for video

A former Chinese diplomat (pictured) who was granted a permanent protection visa in Australia has warned the country is 'turning red'

Mr Chen (pictured in 2005) has claimed he was the target of a planned assassination attempt after his defection, and if he speaks out too much he and his family could be in danger again

'My child will live here, this is our new home, if Chinese influence is here we feel like we are still in China,' Mr Chen said in an interview with China Uncensored.

'This place is turning red, I don't want my child to be brainwashed as I was.

'Now we can see the Chinese propaganda here, and as you can see in the Sam Dastyari case, even the MPs speak for China.'

Mr Chen said China has never given up its Cold War mentality, and are biding their time until they can make an ideological attack on the West.

'My child will live here, this is our new home, if Chinese influence is here we feel like we are still in China,' Mr Chen (pictured in 2005) said

Yonglin Chen, who risked his life to defect from the Chinese Consulate in Sydney (pictured while being shut down ), said Chinese government influence is growing stronger in Australia

He described the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) as a cult which uses fascist aesthetics to hide the lies and brutality of an evil dictatorship.

'There are many way to silence dissident voices, one is to infiltrate Chinese community organisations via money,' he said.

'They also try to isolate the dissidents' voice, and Falun Gong, from 2001 to 2005 when I was in the Consulate, was the main target, to make the Chinese community resent the Falun Gong practitioners, and it's very effective.'

Mr Chen previously claimed diplomats were required to distribute anti-Falun Gong materials and denounce the group, and said they were less of a cult than the CCP.

Mr Chen previously claimed diplomats were required to distribute anti-Falun Gong materials and denounce the group, and said they were less of a cult than the CCP (pictured are Falun Gong protesters)

After his defection Mr Chen told ABC TV he was scared after being tipped off about a hit squad sent from China to kill him.

During the interview he said he believed it was a team from the Chinese Ministry of State Security - the country's intelligence and security agency.

Poll Are you concerned about Chinese government influence in Australia? Yes No I don't know Are you concerned about Chinese government influence in Australia? Yes 180 votes

No 9 votes

I don't know 8 votes Now share your opinion





His sources inside the Chinese government told him the team were given a mission to target him or his family, and may have been planning to kidnap him and take him back to China.

Mr Chen's comments come as an Australian professor said he faced attempts to have a book critical of the Chinese government pulled from publication.

Charles Sturt University Professor of Public Ethics Clive Hamilton claimed he was followed by Chinese government agents and put under surveillance.

In his book Silent Invasion: How China is Turning Australia into a Puppet State, Mr Hamilton warns Australians to 'wake up' to Chinese influence.

The Chinese Government was influencing 'all of Australia's major institutions, from politics to media, business and universities', he said.

No area of Australian society, politics or culture, is free from influence if there's an opportunity there. They'll infiltrate anything they can.'

Mr Chen (pictured, left, with China Uncensored's Chris Chappell) said China has never given up its Cold War mentality, and are biding their time until they can make an ideological attack the West

Mr Chen appeared alongside Dr Feng Chongyi, Associate Professor in China Studies at the University of Technology Sydney ,and Dr Kevin Carrico from the Department of International Studies at Macquarie University a recent panel discussion in Sydney.

The speakers at the forum, hosted by China Uncensored, discussed Chinese government 'inflitration' of Australia.

China Uncensored is run by New York-based New Tang Dynasty Television (NTD), which was founded in 2001 by Falun Gong practitioners as an independent Chinese-language news media outlet.

The Chinese Communist Party and Chinese embassies overseas have regularly exerted political pressure in efforts to have NTD blocked or shut down.

NTD's Youtube channels are blocked in China.