Development
of Foreign Relations
Acting in accordance with the
above-mentioned principles, China established diplomatic relations
with 19 countries in the 19 months between October 1949 and May
1951. Between the second half of the 1950s and the late 1960s, a
large number of newly independent nations established diplomatic
relations with China. By the end of 1969, the countries having diplomatic
relations with China had increased to 50. In the 1970s, the door
was opened, allowing normal relations between China and the United
States, and China’s legitimate seat in the United Nations and the
Security Council was restored. These developments allowed China’s
foreign relations to enter a new stage. Japan, the United States
and other Western countries joined a great number of Third World
countries in establishing diplomatic relations with China, raising
the total number of countries having diplomatic relations with China
to 121 by the end of 1979. In the 1980s, even more countries in
Asia, Africa, Latin America and Oceania established diplomatic relations
with China. Since the beginning of the 1990s, China has established
diplomatic relations with still more countries, such as Israel,
the Republic of Korea and South Africa, as well as with the newly
independent republics that emerged from the former Soviet Union.
By the end of 1999, 161 countries had diplomatic relations with
China.
|
On
January 27, 1999, Vice-President Hu Jintao of the PRC met with Ghanaian
President Jerry John Rawlings in Accra.
|