Canberra, 12 March 1971
Confidential
At his request Keeble2 of the United Kingdom Office, who takes charge in Johnston’s3 absence, called this morning. His purpose was to tell me of a conversation that took place in Peking on 3rd March between Wang Jun-Sheng,Director of West European and other Departments of the Ministry of ForeignTrade, whose responsibilities probably include Australia, and Laughton4 of theUnited Kingdom Mission at a dinner party. Wang Jun-Sheng raised the subject of wheat purchases. Wang said with some vehemence that an Australian Minister had made a statement to the effect that in supplying wheat to China theAustralians had been ‘acting against their own consciences’. Wang had said that this was a stupid statement which reflected the Australian Government’s policy of tailing after the Americans and he compared it with American attempts to ’strangle the Chinese economy’ during the Korean War.
Keeble told me that Wang was aware before this conversation took place thatLaughton would soon pass through Australia on leave (though not, they hoped,that there were arrangements for him to see Australian officials). It may therefore be, the U.K. Mission reported, that Wang hoped to make political or commercial capital from making these remarks. Keeble said the U.K. did not know the precise position regarding Sino-Australian contacts over further wheat sales, and so cannot judge the remarks in their exact context. However, he added, Wang is a senior official who would not speak irresponsibly. Wang had strongly implied that no further wheat contracts would be signed, at least short of a change of Australian policy (presumably at least some sort of dementi). This possibility is obviously strengthened, the U.K. Mission reported, by Chou En-Lai’s announcement through Edgar Snow5 that Chinese grain output in 1970 was considerably more than conventional Western estimates.
[NAA: A1838, 3107/38, viii]
- 1 Sir (Cyrus) Lenox Hewitt, Secretary, Prime Minister’s Department.
- 2 Herbert Keeble, Minister (Commercial), UK High Commission, Canberra.
- 3 Sir Charles Johnston, UK High Commissioner in Canberra.
- 4 J.D. Laughton, First Secretary (Commercial), UK Embassy, Peking.
- 5 Edgar Pars Snow, US journalist and China correspondent.