}
QUESTION:
And it seems to me what you are saying
here is, because of their rather poor tactics over this
1
period they are limited to their hard core-support at the
moment?
or, bribe.
SIR DAVID TRENCH: And the people they can intimidate
{
QUESTION: of this hard core support, are they
mostly aliens or natives?
SIR DAVID TRENCH: I do not think we have ever done
a run-down on the nationality of these people but I would
think, mostly alien.
QUESTION:
Hong Kong
What roughly is the population of
what?
SIR DAVID TRENCH: Roughly 3.8 million.
QUESTION: And the left-wing trade unions would be
SIR DAVID TRENCH: The figure of paid up membership
that runs through my head is 170,000. That figure can be
looked up.
QUESTION: Is there a problem in the sense, when
you said half these people are aliens, is there a feeling
and this must turn up with the problem of participation in
elections have you a feeling a large part of the population
is wobbly, not basically loyal to a concept of a separate
Hong Kong?
Ja
SIR DAVID TRENCH: I do not know that I quite
understood your question. I think you could say the basic
Hong Kong feeling is, it wants Hong Kong to stay as it has
been exactly for the last twenty years, standards rising,
cost of living kept down, that sort of thing, and mostly they
say we must stand firm, we have nowhere else to go, this is
the end of the line.
-25-