Australia's Trade Minister has accused China of breaching the terms of its free trade agreement.
Speaking in the Senate this morning, Simon Birmingham suggested China might also be in breach of World Trade Organisation rules.
"The targeted nature of Chinese government measures on Australian goods raises concerns about China's adherence to the letter and spirit of its ChAFTA and WTO obligations," Senator Birmingham said.
"After a reasonable start in bilateral engagement, in recent years the Chinese government's lack of engagement has prevented use of these structures."
It comes as China added lamb to its list of Australian products it is refusing to accept.
China has refused to accept sheep meat from two major meat processors after they were closed because of COVID-19 outbreaks.
The Australian Lamb Company and JBS Brooklyn were had coronavirus clusters associated with their facilities, but have been back open for months.
The JBC Brooklyn abattoir in Melbourne was linked to dozens of cases in July, but it has been months since a case was connected to the plant.
Dozens of cases were also connected to the Australian Lamb Company abattoir in Colac around the same time.
China has used those outbreaks as justification for not accepting meat from the plants.
In spite of this, China has not stopped accepting meat from American abattoirs connected with coronavirus outbreaks.
Over the weekend Chinese state-run media outlet the Global Times wrote the initial Wuhan outbreak may have originated from imported food.
The lamb sanctions follow Chinese trade action against Australian wine, coal, lobsters, timber, cotton and beef.
China is by far Australia's biggest export market.
Treasurer Josh Frydenberg lamented the trade issues.
"This is a very challenging situation for us because China is our largest trading partner and it has been mutually beneficial," Mr Frydenberg told Today.
"What we have provided China has helped their economic growth and what they have provided us is a major market for our exports, and we'll continue to work through these issues where we can't resolve them bilaterally, we obviously reserve the right to use multilateral forums."
But he noted there were other countries with which Australia could expand its trade relationships.
"When it comes to our free trade agreement we did see a substantial increase in that trading relationship between our countries and China is not our only free trade agreement partner, we've reached such agreements with a whole range of other countries and that's been good news for our exporters," he said.
"There's no secret, this is a challenging time for the Australia-China relationship and we will work through these issues."
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Tensions between China and Australia have been at their highest point in decades, with Beijing sending Canberra a list of grievances last month.
The grievances include the banning of Huawei from Australia's 5G rollout, Australia's stance on the South China Sea, calling for an inquiry on the origins of coronavirus, and speaking out against human rights issues in Xinjiang and Hong Kong.
Last week a Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson tweeted a doctored image of an Australian soldier threatening an Afghan child with a bloodied knife.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison demanded an apology, but the Communist Party has stood firm.
"There are undoubtedly tensions that exist between China and Australia. But that's not how you deal with it," he said.
"It is deeply offensive to every Australian who has served in uniform.
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