CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — Australia's Parliament has passed sweeping national security legislation that bans covert foreign interference in domestic politics and makes industrial espionage for a foreign power a crime.

The two bills covering foreign interference, espionage and influence transparency have been criticized as criminalizing dissent. The Senate made them law on Thursday with the support of the center-left Labor Party opposition on the last day of Parliament before mid August.

The conservative government says the legislation, first proposed in December, is the major cause of a rift in diplomatic relations with China, Australia's most important trading partner. But the government maintains it is not aimed at any particular country.

Foreign interference in the latest U.S. and French presidential elections has been cited as justifications for the reforms.