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- WORLD, Page 37World NotesDIPLOMACYLong March to Recognition
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- Political representatives of two of the world's oldest
- cultures met in Beijing last week and established diplomatic
- relations. "This is a moment we have awaited for a long time,"
- exulted Israeli Foreign Minister David Levy. The accord between
- the Jewish state and China culminates a 40-year effort by Israel,
- one of the first noncommunist countries to recognize the
- People's Republic after its creation in 1949.
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- A staunch backer of the Palestine Liberation Organization,
- China finally succumbed to Jerusalem's courtship out of a desire
- to re-enter the world stage. Beijing wants to dispel the smoke
- of ostracism that still hangs over it from the 1989 Tiananmen
- massacre and fill the power vacuum left by the Soviet Union's
- breakup.
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- China is getting a ticket to attend this week's round of
- Middle East talks in Moscow. Israel gains a higher international
- profile and an embassy from which it will try to increase its
- trade with China and decrease Chinese arms sales to the Arab
- world.
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