K.D. Lang, the popular Canadian singer, was cooing over Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's performance in Beijing last week. Lang, a member of the Free Tibet movement, called Mr Rudd 'most amazing', 'fearless' and 'graceful' for the way in which he was prepared to publicly criticise China over its crackdown in Tibet. 'I'm very moved by him,' Lang said on tour in Australia. The significance of her praise would not have been lost on Mr Rudd. China was the last stop on his first major overseas trip since he became prime minister last November, and he was under pressure from his political opponents at home to take a tough stance on Tibet when he met with the Chinese leadership. Mr Rudd is the only Putonghua-speaking leader in the western world, and he has flaunted his long-standing diplomatic and cultural ties to China. Mr Rudd has boasted that his affinity with China will enable him to cement Australia's position as a nation that can be friends to China on the one hand, and Japan and the US on the other. But Mr Rudd's domestic political opponents have accused him of being blind to China's foibles and of snubbing Australia's traditional Asian ally, Japan. The fact that Mr Rudd included Washington, Brussels, London and Beijing on his inaugural globetrotting but ignored Tokyo only reinforced those arguments. Given this background, Mr Rudd's visit to Beijing last week took on a new significance. It is no exaggeration to say that his task in Beijing was a difficult one. It is clearly in Australia's interests to engage China on an even deeper economic and strategic level than is already the case, but the plight of the Tibetans is a popular cause in Australia. Fortunately for Mr Rudd, he appears to have succeeded in managing that task with relative aplomb. He pulled no punches in a speech to students at Beijing University last Wednesday when he said that 'it is necessary to recognise there are significant human rights problems in Tibet' and that the 'current situation in Tibet is of concern to Australians'. It was a message he delivered privately and publicly in his meetings with Premier Wen Jiabao , and which got him favourable headlines back in Australia, perhaps because the frankness of Mr Rudd's remarks were somewhat unexpected. If his Chinese hosts were disappointed in their long-standing friend's stance on Tibet they did not show it, if the agreement by the countries on other issues such as climate change is anything to go by. Under Mr Rudd's predecessor, John Howard, the matter of engaging China on climate change took a back seat to the desire to build strong economic ties through a free-trade deal. But that is not the case today. Mr Rudd's Climate Change Minister Penny Wong went to Beijing last week and, along with Mr Rudd, announced A$95 million (HK$687 million) worth of climate change projects between the two countries. The friendly reception Mr Rudd got in China, despite his blunt remarks on Tibet, is no doubt influenced by Beijing's knowledge that Australia advocates China taking a leading role in tackling major global issues. Mr Rudd made this clear in a speech in Washington on March 31 when he argued that China should be invited by the US to take a leading role in bringing the Doha Round of WTO negotiations to a successful conclusion, and that if a post-Kyoto climate change framework is to be genuinely global, China must be among its major facilitators. Mr Rudd's China balancing act has been a case of so far, so good. His next big test is the Olympics. Mr Rudd does not favour a boycott of the Beijing Games because he says it will do nothing to improve the daily lives of Tibetans, but he has yet to confirm whether he will accept China's invitation to attend the opening ceremony. It's always best to keep some powder dry, as they say. Greg Barns is a political commentator in Australia and a former Australian government adviser