Telegram on the Establishment of the Provisional Government
(September 22, 1958)

His Excellency Ferhat Abbas, Prime Minister of the Provisional Government of the Algerian Republic:

Thank you for your letter of September 19, 1958.Ill. On behalf of my country and all its people, and in my own name, I warmly congratulate the establishment of the Provisional Government of the Algerian Republic. May the brave Algerian people achieve ever more brilliant and greater victories in their struggle for national independence and against colonialism!

Mao Zedong, President of the People’s Republic of China
September 22, 1958
[1]
Refers to Ferhat Abbas’s letter to Mao Zedong dated September 19, 1958. After describing the circumstances surrounding the formation of the Algerian Provisional Government, the letter stated: “The establishment of the Provisional Government of the Algerian Republic has fulfilled the ardent aspirations of the Algerian people; it is the inevitable outcome of an irresistible force of natural development. It is the fruit of more than four years of heroic struggle by the Algerian people, during which over six hundred thousand lives were sacrificed.” The letter also praised Mao Zedong as a great master of the liberation of the peoples of Asia and an indefatigable champion of the right of peoples to self-determination. Furthermore, it noted: “In view of the magnificent support extended by the glorious Chinese people to the Algerian revolutionary cause, and since the establishment of our government will be recorded in history as a decisive factor in the liberation of suffering Algeria, I am confident that the Government of the People’s Republic of China will be among the first to recognize the Algerian government formed at 1 p.m. on September 19, 1958.”

On September 22, 1958, Chen Yi, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China, sent a telegram to Mohamed Lamine Debaghine, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Provisional Government of the Algerian Republic, informing him that the Chinese government had decided to recognize the Provisional Government of the Algerian Republic.