The result was sharply down from four years ago in 2018.


An annual poll by the Lowy Institute, a Sydney-based foreign policy think tank, found just 12 per cent of Australians said they trusted China as an international player. The result was sharply down from four years ago in 2018 when the think tank found about 52 per cent of Australians had a positive view of the country.

Speaking in Canberra on Wednesday, Lowy's Executive Director Michael Fullilove said the result was "no cause for celebration".

It is in our interest that relations between Canberra and Beijing are stable," he said.

This is in China's interest too, he added.

A diplomatic freeze had been in place between Canberra and Beijing for more than two years after former Prime Minister Scott Morrison called for an international investigation into the origins of Wuhan virus in April 2020.

The Lowy survey, which is due to be released in full later this month, found support for the US alliance among Australians is at an all-time high, with 87 per cent saying it was important to the country's security.

At the same time, just 53 per cent of Australians said they felt "very safe" or "safe" in the current global environment.