Canberra has made clear its “concern” directly to Beijing after the Chinese military test fired a nuclear capable missile in the South Pacific.Chinese state media on Monday reported that a nuclear submarine fired the missile at noon (Beijing time) and that it “landed precisely within the designated waters”.It came just hours after Australia and Fiji inked a mutual defence pact that could be extended to other Pacific countries.Deputy Prime Minister and Defence Minister Richard Marles said on Tuesday the federal government protested the test both in Australia and in China.“We have expressed the concern at a direct government-to-government level, both in Canberra and Beijing,” he told Sky News, adding that it “will be a topic” when Australia and China next hold ministerial meetings.“But we have already, at a government-to-government level, made our position clear.”Mr Marles would not say whether the Chinese ambassador had been summoned but insisted the government had expressed “our concern about this test”.During the interview he also said the test “implies something about the range that China is building in terms of deploying nuclear capabilities”.He said that was the concern rather than the timing coinciding with the Fiji alliance, which he said could have been a coincidence.“What’s significant here is a long-range missile test and one which China itself has said could be nuclear-capable, launched from a submarine,” Mr Marles said.“That’s the message that’s being sent. The test is a display of an extended range that China now has in terms of deploying a nuclear weapon, and that’s obviously very concerning.”Opposition defence spokesman James Paterson echoed Mr Marles, saying “the broader picture here is that China is engaging in behaviour which it knows is threatening”.“One of the reasons why militaries conduct exercises like these is for the demonstration effect,” he told Nine’s Today.“They want others to know they’ve got the capability to do so, and their decision to do so in the Pacific is particularly unwelcome because the Pacific Island leaders have made very clear they want their region of the world to be a conflict-free zone, and they also want it to be nuclear-free zone.”Senator Paterson also said the government response had been “appropriate”.“They should make clear, as they have, that they don’t approve of what the Chinese government has done here in our region of the world, and I think it’s reasonable for them to seek an explanation from the (People’s Republic of China) about why they did this,” he said.“We were given incredibly minimal notice of this exercise – just two hours.”In Beijing, the Chinese government played down the test overnight and urged people not to “interpret too much” from it despite it being the first known Chinese submarine-based missile launch in more than four decades.“This is a routine military exercise,” a foreign ministry spokeswoman said.“It does not target any third party or targets, and it’s been notified in advance to the relevant countries and in accordance with international law and international practice.”It has not been interpreted that way internationally.Posting an image of the missile’s trajectory on social media, Taiwan’s national security chief said China had “just proved itself again to be a bully on the block”.The test also sounded alarm bells in Europe, with NATO secretary-general Mark Rutte saying it made the case for “close co-operation”, as North Atlantic and Indo-Pacific theatres are “getting more intertwined”.“What happens in the Indo-Pacific is relevant to what is happening in the transatlantic, and we see it also with the war with Ukraine, where China, North Korea and Iran are key enablers of Russia’s unprovoked war of aggression against Ukraine.“This again is evidence that we cannot be naive, and I can assure you that we are on it.”More to comeRead related topics:China