Saturday, 2 December

Snow, cold

At noon Counsellor Chen Jingchen and the third daughter of Counsellor Li Shaolan had her wedding ceremony in the main hall of the Embassy. I was the witness.

At 2.00 p.m. I went to the train station to welcome De Gaulle.

At 8.30 Chen and Liu had their wedding feast in the Chinese Embassy. Many guests from the Diplomatic Corps and the Soviet side attended. Ambassador Kerr talked to me with regard to the reorganisation of our Central Government, saying that Chen Cheng was the ideal choice, but the status of Yu Hongjun was not high enough. I replied that inside and outside China the criticism regarding the Ministry of Finance was corruption, and he should know that Yu Hongjun was well-known for his integrity. He said my view was absolutely correct. As for Zhu Jiahua, Kerr thought that he was not pro-German. I urged him that on returning to Britian he should suggest to Churchill and Eden that they shouldn’t over-criticise Chinese politics and the military, they should instead try their best to help China. He said he was sympathetic to this, but he said that the various criticisms came from the United States. In the past the American side praised China too much, and this was also true about criticism. This was the American character. Kerr also agreed that he would talk with Gui Weijin about the Soviet situation. The Belgian Ambassador discussed with me about filing a protest to the Soviet Union with regard to its newspapers attacking Belgium. I told him he should be careful with his action.

Today Izvestia published an article attacking China. War and Labour Class also published an article, which was much fiercier in criticising China.