The Foreign Ministry agreed Wang to accept the invite from Johnson and asked for more details about the dinner arrangement.

Wang drafted certain issues that might be touched upon during the private dinner with Johnson and asked for permission from the Foreign Ministry. The US might: (1) Explain the current situation and wish to improve Sino-US relations; (2) Continue searching China’s bottom-line with soft methods; (3) Want to test China’s attitude on improving Sino-US relations; (4) Test China’s opinion on the second agenda.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry claims that the US wants to test China’s bottom-line regarding the release of US citizens in China.

The US proposed to postpone the twelfth meeting from 27th to 31st. Wang conjured that the US needed to change their strategy since they had not got their way of having China promise a time for the release of US citizens. Wang suggested some possible changes of US strategy and requested further instructions from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

The Foreign Ministry's instructions regarding revising the draft, the preferred words, and the exchange of text and the information to release to the US after reaching an agreement.

Telegrams from Geneva should be given to Premier Zhou. Telegrams from Geneva to ambassador to the USSR will be conveyed by the Ministry.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry sends instructions for the Sino-American ambassadorial talks.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry suspected that China’s release of 11 American spies had put pressure on the US side, making the US open to the idea of having a higher level meeting. The Foreign Ministry instructed the Chinese representatives to urge the US to promise to release Chinese students in the US in the next meeting, and also urge the US to accept the suggestion of bringing in third country (India) to help the release process, including financial support.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry instructed Chinese Representative Wang Bingnan to have the following major agreements in writing on the fifth meeting:
(1) Any nationals who were willing to return to their countries should be granted permission;
(2) China designated India and the US designated the UK to facilitate the repatriation of each other’s nationals.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry estimated the issues that the US would raise in the next meeting, including the wording in the agreement and whether to issue a joint statement or separated ones, and instructed Chinese Representative Wang Bingnan the proper responses.