Telegram, Mao Zedong to Liu Shaoqi and Zhou Enlai, 19 December 1949 (excerpt)

Telegram, Mao Zedong to Liu Shaoqi and Zhou Enlai, 19 December 1949 (excerpt)

(1) As to the question of the Burmese government's request to establish diplomatic relations with us, you should ask it in a return telegram if it is willing to cut off its diplomatic relations with the Guomindang, and at the same time invite that government to dispatch a responsible representative to Beijing for discussions about establishing diplomatic relations between China and Burma. Whether the diplomatic relations will be established or not will be determined by the result of the discussions. It is necessary that we should go through this procedure of discussion, and we should act in the same way toward all capitalist countries. If a certain capitalist country openly announces the desire to establish diplomatic relations with us, our side should telegraph that country and request that it dispatch its representative to China for discussions about establishing diplomatic relations, and at the same time, we may openly publish the main contents of the telegram. By doing so, we will be able to control the initiative.1

1 After the Burmese government had cut off all formal relations with the GMD government in Taiwan, the PRC and Burma established diplomatic relations on 8 June 1950.