Cable from the Chinese Embassy in Hungary, ‘The 8th Plenum of the Polish Party Central Committee has met with a Great Response in Hungary’

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To the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Party Central Committee:

The 8th Plenum of the Polish Party Central Committee has met with a great response in Hungary. Szabad Nép [Free People] today published Gomułka‘s speech in its entirety, as well as a brief commentary and a report. In the commentary it is written that the Polish events of past few days carry decisive importance not only for the Polish people, but for the future path of the international communist movement.^[1] According to the report, the party secretary at the Zeran car factory in Poland told a mass rally that the Polish comrades were not alone, and that Chinese, Yugoslav, and Hungarian workers supported them.^[2] The editorial office of Szabad Nép sent a telegram to the editorial office of Trybuna Ludu, in which it congratulated the Polish people on their “great struggle for socialist construction, democratization, strengthening the sovereignty of the homeland, and consolidation of the friendship between Poland and the Soviet Union on the basis of the principles of proletarian internationalism.” The Hungarian Writers’ Association issued an announcement, in which it expressed warm support for the Polish events. Magyar Nemzet [Hungarian Nation] also published Gomułka’s speech in its entirety. Népszava published two-thirds of the speech, as well as a report, and their telegram of good wishes to the Polish paper Głos Pracy. The Hungarian Journalists’ Association sent a telegram of good wishes to the Polish Journalists’ Association. The Polish paper SztandarMłodych^[3] published an editorial entitled “Long live the Hungarian comrades!” which contained the following: “Hungary and Poland are at the forefront of the de-Stalinization process and the restitution of popular power.” This afternoon, Budapest university students organized a demonstration attended by tens of thousands in support of the Polish events; their slogans were “independence, freedom, democracy” (for details see separate report).

[Chinese] Embassy in Hungary

23 October

Received: 24 October at 06:54; printed: 24 October at 12:57

^[1] “On the Polish crises,” Szabad Nép (Budapest) (23 October 1956): 2.

^[2] “The complete unity of people and leadership in Poland,” Szabad Nép (23 October 1956): 2.

^[3] The central paper of the Polish Youth Association.