It is worth nothing how Chinese sources reported the official PDRY delegation's visit in their official coverage. Formal diplomatic relations were esteablished on 31 January 1968 between the Pople's Republic of China and the newly founder state of the People's Republic of South Yemen ( referred to here as the People's Democratic Republic of South Yemen - PDRY) at a ceremony in Cairo attended by Muhammed Hadi 'Awad ,plenipotentiary of the government of the PDRY, and the only high-ranking ambassador from the People's Republic of China outside the country, Huang Hua, since all others were recalled during the Cultural Revolution. During the Cultural Revolution, Huang Hua was reputed to be the most senior member of the Chinese diplomatic service. A student activist in the 1930s and subsequently an interpreter for the Chinese Communist Party in charge of the English-speaking section, he had been a close associate of Chou En-Lai since the Geneva Conference of April 1954 and the Bandung Conference in April 1955. In August 1960 he received his first post as the PRC's first ambassador to Ghana, where he made several diplomatic breakthroughs for China among the African nations, especially in what was then called Tanganyika, in December 1961, Congo (Brazzaville), in February 1964, and Dahomey, in November 1964. He was also in charge of signing trade, diplomatic, technical and friendship treaties and agreements. In March 1966, he was appointed as ambassador to the United Arab Republic (Egypt), thus assuming charge of the PRC's most important diplomatic post, both in the Arab world and in Africa. He was the only Chinese ambassador who remained in his post during the upheavals of the Cultural Revolution. He was stationed in Cairo until becoming the first Chinese ambassador to the United Nations in October 1971. The press communiqué mentioned, inter alia, that:
The Government of the People's Republic of China has recognized the People's Republic of Southern Yemen and the Tatter's sovereignty over all its territories and islands. The Government of the People's Republic of Southern Yemen recognized the Government of the People's Republic of China as the sole legal Government representing all the Chinese people.[Italics added]

China and the People's Democratic Republic of Yemen
In the midst of the Cultural Revolution and at a time when China had recalled all its ambassadors, save for the prominent figure of Huang Hua stationed in Cairo, the establishment of formal diplomatic relations was certainly a breakthrough, particularly on the issue of recognizing the PRC as the sole legal government representing all the Chinese people. Moreover, the newly established state of the PDRY came about after less than a year had passed since the Arab-Israeli Six-Day War of June 1967.
People's Daily carried an editorial which devoted most attention to the `general' Arab situation whereby Arab `anti-imperialism' is considered to be one of the most important factors for `uniting the destiny of the Chinese and Arab peoples', with particular attention given to the struggle of the Palestinian people. Moreover, the editorial stressed that the `anti-imperialist' trend it the Arab world, carried by the Arab people rather than the Arab governments, was directed against `U.S. imperialism.' Thus, nothing was mentioned about `Soviet revisionists -- imperialists'. Which seems peculiar since Chinese anti-USSR sentiments were given high priority during the Cultural Revolution. Eight months after establishing diplomatic relations, on 17 September 1968, an official high-ranking PDRY delegation arrived in Peking. Before dealing with the main text, we will concentrate here on Chinese press commentaries and official statements made during the visit. It is noteworthy in this connection that the late Faysal'Abd al-latif noted down what the Chinese had expressed in opinions rather than what the delegation members had to say in analyzing various conditions prevailing in the Arabian Peninsula and the Gulf.
Upon the arrival of the delegation, the mood of the receptions was `typical' of circumstances during the Cultural Revolution. The delegation was headed by the late Foreign Minister, Saif Ahmad al-'Dal'i, and was received in Peking, after a stopover in Shanghai, by:
Vice-Premier Ch'en Yi and more than one thousand revolutionary people . . . (and) among the welcomers were representatives of the Capital's Workers' Mao Tse-Tung's Thought Propaganda Teams, leading members of revolutionary mass organisations and representatives of `Five-Good' Fighters from the Chinese People's Liberation Army Units stationed in Peking. . . . Present at the airport were leading members of the Government departments concerned, the People's Liberation Army and the Peking Municipal Revolutionary Committee, including Wang Hsin-ting, Chiao Kuan-hua, Li Chian, Hsieh Huai-teh and Hsiang Chien.'
China and the People's Democratic Republic of Yemen
Of the receiving officials and government departments represented, Marshal Ch'en Yi deserves a brief mention, which will throw some light on his career. (Chiao Kuan-hua was later appointed as China's ambassador to the United Nations, a post he held after Huang Hua's tenure there.)
Ch'en Yi, educated in France, where he was a student activist, returned to China to continue his activities after joining the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). He then studied military science at the then famous Whampoa Military Academy. After the Red Army was created in 1927, Ch'en Yi assumed a post as one of its top commanders. In the 1930s he was known to be a close associate of Mao Tse-Tung and Chou En-lai, anby 1941 he had become the acting commander of the New Fourth Army. After 1949, he held several prominent posts, the most important being that of the Mayor of Shanghai. In 1952 he attended the Nineteenth Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in Moscow with Liu Shao; it was the last Congress held during Stalin's lifetime. Beginning in 1961, he accompanied Chou En-lai in representing China abroad, especially in Southeast Asia and the Middle East, which put him in the position of signing numerous agreements and treaties on China's behalf. He also shared with Chou En-lai the chairmanship of the Chinese People's Institute of Foreign Affairs in 1964. When the Cultural Revolution erupted, Ch'en Yi was known to be a close ally of Chou En-lai, and remained a voice of moderation throughout the turmoil of events. When the radical elements of the Cultural Revolution besieged the Foreign Ministry for a week in August 1967, the Minister, Marshal Ch'en Yi, was forced to indulge in `self-criticism' for leading a `revisionist' policy. It was amid such tumult that Marshal Ch'en Yi received the PDRY delegation.
On 18 September 1968 both sides - the PDRY and Ch'en Yi held talks `in a friendly atmosphere'4 and, at a banquet honouring the visiting delegation, Ch'en Yi unleashed attacks reflecting China's foreign policy priorities, with regard to which the PDRY delegation was at no time willing to take sides. He went on to state China's three main policy objectives:
Our South Yemeni friends may rest assured that in their struggle against imperialism, colonialism, and neo-colonialism, the Chinese people will remain forever their reliable friends . . . U.S. imperialism and Soviet revisionism are mortally afraid of the revolutionary storms of the people

China and the People's Democratic Republic of Yemen

of the world. They collude and fight each other in a vain attempt to re-
divide the world and their spheres of influence and thus control the world situation and practise neo-colonialism. During the Caribbean crisis, Soviet revisionism first followed a policy of adventurism and then a policy of capitulationism towards U.S. imperialism and actually recognized Cuba as within the tatter's sphere of influence. While feigning support Soviet revisionism is actually betraying the Vietnamese people in their war against U.S. aggression and for national salvation and helping U.S. imperialism to perpetuate the forcible occupation of Southern Vietnam. Likewise in the Middle East war last year [1967), Soviet revisionism, while feigning support, is actually trying to control the Arab people and helping U.S.-Israeli aggression. In Africa, Soviet revisionism, in league with U.S. and British imperialism, is even openly supporting the military Government of Federal Nigeria in `massacring the Biafran people in a vain attempt to squeeze into Nigeria and enjoy an equal share with imperialism there. . . . The Soviet revisionists' aggression against Czechoslovakia has strengthened the position of U.S. imperialism and Israel, its tool for aggression in the Middle East, and inflated the aggressive arrogance and expansionist ambitions of Zionism. . . . Zionism is an extremely reactionary trend of thought which we resolutely oppose. We firmly support the Arab people in their just struggle against aggression by U.S. imperialism and Israel. We firmly oppose the Soviet revisionist renegade clique's criminal schemes of selling out the interests of the Arab people.
He then went on to shed some light on the importance of Mao's thought in building socialism in China. All of this appeared to the delegation as a form of lecturing that under no circumstances could be adopted and/or adhered to by the leaders of the PDRY. For example, to embark on a crusade of anti-Sovietism would certainly be an impediment for building socialism in the newly established state. The only point of agreement was the question of Zionism as a body of political thought with its manifestation, Israel; but no consensus could even be reached with regard to `Soviet-revisionist' designs in the Arab-Israeli conflict.
In replying, Foreign Minister Saif Ahmad al-'Dal'i. pointed out three major foreign policy priorities of the PDRY, thus taking a position of disagreement with Ch'en Yi's approach to handling international and national causes:

China and the People's Democratic Republic of Yemen
The subversive attempts against the People's Republic of Southern Yemen . . . are linked with the constant subversion by imperialism and the Saudi reactionaries against our Northern Yemen. . . . We, progressive revolutionaries of the whole world, should all the more clench our fists in the face of imperialism and colonialism. Otherwise, we would leave openings in our ranks which imperialism might use to preserve its strength and carry out conspiracies' . . . [and hey] expressed Southern Yemen's support for the people of Oman, Dhofar and the Arab Gulf' in their struggle against British occupation.

The Chinese could hardly agree with this approach - a reproof to disunity within the socialist camp-in the midst of the Cultural Revolution. Moreover, what is noteworthy about Ch'en Yi's speech is the total omission of China's support, at this particular date, for what was later to be named the Popular Front for the Liberation of Oman, and likewise the Chinese spokesman's failure to attack the `reactionary' regimes, i.e., Saudi Arabia, in the Arabian Peninsula
and the Gulf. This aspect, Saudi Arabia's presence and role, was to be discussed privately. The situation in Oman, however, warrants a few notes.
China's attitudes to and involvement in Oman went through two distinct phases up to 1968. On the one hand, it was characterized by support for `traditional' forces in Omani traditional disputes. The year 1955 witnessed the rise of a nationalist movement in Muscat and Oman, which was governed by the corrupt anti backward rule of the late Sultan Said bin Taimur. He was challenged in 1954 by the newly elected Imam of Oman, Ghalib bin 'Ali. The Sultan's rule at the time was based largely on the consent of tribal allegiances; a modern state was not yet fully established. Moreover, the rule of the Sultan and his family's continued existence depended to a large extent on the presence of military `advisers' throughout the various branches of the military apparatus. It way the scramble for oil and the unruly tribes of the Omani interior that prompted the Sultan to embark on a military expedition. The Imam, in return, sought the assistance of Egypt's Nasser on the one hand, and of the leadership of Saudi Arabia, on the other; the two were diametrically opposed to each other. By the mid-1960s the movement had dwindled, and the initiation of a more `leftist' orientation commenced.

China and the People's Democratic Republic of Yemen
China's first direct contacts in the Omani war came through the unfolding of events in the Sultanate, and was basically mediated through
Egypt. It was a period which witnessed China's championing of the Imamate cause against both the Sultan and the British. Through the Imamate Office in Cairo, and close contacts with the states of the Bandung Conference, the Deputy Imam. Salih bin 'Isa, received an invitation from the Chinese Islamic Association (CIA) to pay an official visit to China. It is interesting that the invitation came from the Association, but not from other organs or from the various existing `friendship' associations. Most probably, as the document below attests, the Chinese thought that Islam was a sphere which must be exploited by the nationalists, and that it was thus appropriate to open a channel through the Chinese Islamic Association. Moreover, at this time China was advocating that the Arab people, including the Omanis, must rely in their struggle against imperialism, on `the world forces of peace led by the Soviet Union'. Chinese support for the Imamate cause was basically political; no military aid was extended.
The second phase witnessed the gradual radicalization of the nationalist movement in Oman. When later developments created the Dhofar Liberation Front (DLF), China remained supportive of the nationalist cause, and pronouncements and reportage on the Chinese side came through their Cairo offices. Yet, when the movement adopt MarLeninism, in September 1968, under the new name of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Occupied Oman, China was remarkably silent for a short period with respect to the internal developments in Oman.

It was within the context of this atmosphere that the PDRY delegation continued its visit to China. However, the audience on the Chinese side present at the banquet reflected the general political trend prevailing during the upheavals of the Cultural Revolution. They included:
representatives of the Capital's Workers' Mao Tse-tung Thought Propaganda Teams, leading members of revolutionary organizations and representatives of `Five-Good' Fighters from Chinese People's Liberation Army units stationed in Peking. Leading members of Government departments concerned, the People's Liberation Army, the Peking Municipal Revolutionary Committee and other departments concerned, including Wang Hsien-ting, Chiao Kuan-hua, Li Chiang, Hsieh Huai-teh, Hsi Chin and Ting Hsi- lin were also present.
China and the People's Democratic Republic of Yemen
Diplomatic envoys of Arab and African countries in Peking attended the banquets
Chinese reporting on the PDRY became more frequent. In a separate dispatch NCNA reported, from Aden, that both official PDRY periodicals, al-Thauri and October Fourteenth, commented on the delegation's visit to China. The former stated, according to NCNA that the visit `is being conducted under the circumstances of the continuous expression of the world revolutionary movement and the solidarity of the oppressed peoples ... [and] the great Chinese today have become the revolutionaries of the oppressed people in the fight against imperialism, a living model for people longing for the finest society of socialism.' Likewise October Fourteenth was quoted as putting forward two main points, it stated that:
Great China, with its rich experience of revolution has enriched progressive thinking and influenced the idea of world revolution . . . [and] that the revolution of Southern Yemen is part of the world revolutionary movement. Like the revolutions in other areas of the world, it is directed against imperialism headed by the United States and all reactionaries.
Such a statement by the official PDRY media warrants two notes of cautious commentary. On the one hand, the media totally neglected the oft-heard Chinese claim of `Soviet socialist imperialism and revisionism,' but rather viewed the struggle as one aimed against imperialism. On the other hand, the young PDRY leadership was to learn from the Chinese experience in building socialism within a nation but not necessarily in building a socialist foreign policy aligned to one state or another within the socialist bloc. In treating socialism within, the PDRY leadership had a tremendous task facing its existence and an abundance of experience before it on which to draw - various types of experience ranging from that of Yugoslavia to those of the USSR, Korea, China, Cuba, and so forth - all marginally different from the experiences of the PDRY and the politics of the Arabian Peninsula and the Gulf. Moreover, for a young and newly established socialist state, surrounded by hostile forces, to embark on a foreign policy allied to either the Soviet Union or China would certainly limit its ability in building socialism within. Thus, throughout its foreign policy, the PDRY set a course of steering a balanced and independent course within the socialist bloc.
China and the People's Democratic Republic of Yernen
The delegation's itinerary, in Peking, included a visit to a Peoples Liberation Army (PLA) unit, and there they were told:
how it [the PLA] had grown up from a small guerrilla team by adhering to the Great Leader Chairman Mao's theory of army building. Some of the Unit's activists in study reported on their experience in the living study and application of Chairman Mao's work.
On 21 September 1968 Arab diplomatic envoys gave a reception in the delegation's honour,'` which the PDRY delegation reciprocated, and on the same day the President of the PDRY, Qahtanal-Sha'bi, sent a message of greeting to Mao in which he stated:
I take this opportunity to express to Your Excellency, on behalf of the People of Southern Yemen and in my own name, our profound appreciation of your heroic struggle against colonialism, imperialism and their lackeys, and of the great achievements accomplished by the people of China under your daring and wise leadership.
However, there is a discrepancy in dates between Faysal 'Abd al- latif's diary and the official Chinese sources as to the exact date on which the meeting between Chou En-lai and the delegation took place. Faysal notes the date as 23 September, whereas NCNA gives the date as 24 September. The Chinese date is more accurate, as the text of the joint communique issued at the end of the visit attests:
At the invitation of the Government of the People's Republic of China, a delegation of the People's Republic of Southern Yemen led by Foreign Minister Saif Ahmad al-Dal'i paid a goodwill visit to the People's Republic of China from September 17 to 24, 1968.
And on the last day of the official visit, the delegation signed a Trade Agreement and an Agreement on Economic and Technical Co-operation's between the two states in the presence of Chou En-lai and Foreign Minister Ch'en Yi, representing the PRC, while the PDRY was represented by the Foreign Minister and the following members of the delegation: Faysal 'Abd al-latif al Sha'bi, 'Ali 'Ahmad 'Antar, Saleh Muhammad Wheishi, Nadim Hussain 'Ali, and Muhammad Mahdi. What is remarkable about this agreement is its timing, not to mention its
Introduction

content. It is one of the few occasions on which the Chinese leadership involved itself in an agreement with a foreign state in the midst of the Cultural Revolution. There seem to be several reasons for this. In the first place, Chou En-lai and his `moderate' colleagues had a firm grip on the state apparatus, i.e., the administrative hierarchy, especially the Foreign Ministry, in comparison with the radical elements involved in internal upheavals. Second, the leadership of the new state (PDRY) was embarking on the establishment of a radical-socialist state in the heart of the Arab world. Aid from various socialist states was a necessity. Third, though China had established diplomatic relations with the Republic of Yemen (North Yemen) at an earlier time, the period of the monarchy, the strategic importance of the PDRY could not be neglected. Fourth, aid to the PDRY would be a significant area for competition with the USSR. Last, the establishment of diplomatic relations with both Yemens certainly represented an opening for China, not only in the Arabian Peninsula, where Saudi Arabia was the most important entity, but also in the Arabian Gulf. China had no diplomatic breakthrough until 1971, when relations were established with Kuwait.
On 24 September 1968, the delegation returned to Aden where
the Foreign Minister, Saif A)~mad al-Dal'i, declared that:
Through our visits to Chinese workers, peasants and soldiers,
we saw the great achievement of the Chinese Cultural Revolution. We learned a lot during our visit to China.

References
1 Hsinhua News Agency, 2 February 1968, Peking
2 Hsinhua News Agency, People's Daily, 3 February 1968, Peking
3 (a) Hsinhua News Agency, l8 September 1968, Peking
(b) Egyptian Gazette, 19 September 1968
4 Hsinhua News Agency, 19 September 1968, Peking
5 Hsinhua News Agency, 19 September 1968, Peking
6 Hsinhua News Agency, 19 September 1968, Peking
7 Hsinhua News Agency, 19 September 1968, Peking
8 Hsinhua News Agency, 22 September 1968, Peking
9 Hsinhua News Agency, 20 September 1968, Aden
10 Hsinhua News Agency, 20 September 1968, Aden
Introduction

11 Hsinhua News Agency, 21 September 1968, Peking
12 Hsinhua News Agency, 22 September 1968, Peking
13 Hsinhua News Agency, 23 September 1968, Peking
14 Hsinhua News Agency, 3 October 1968, Peking (a message of greeting
on China's National Day).
15 Hsinhua News Agency, 25 September 1968, Peking
16 Hsinhua News Agency, 26 September 1968, Peking
17 HsinhuaNewsAgency, 26 September 1968, Peking
18 Hsinhua News Agency, 25 September 1968, Peking .