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18 November in the hope that this would result in Mr. Grey's release. He remained strongly averse to the simultaneous release of Hsueh and Lo without a prior guarantee that this would secure r. Grey's freedom. In the light of exchanges with the Chinese It seemed highly unlikely that any such assurance would be given.
5. The Chargé d'Affaires in Peking argued strongly on humanitarian and other grounds that we should release Hsueh and Lo immediately as such a gesture would be best calculated to secure Mr. Grey's release. There is considerable force in this
argument. But to do so would have been a gambler's throw. If it had not worked, we should have put ourselves in a most awkward and indefensible position from the point of view of public and Parliamentary opinion in this country. Moreover it would have been extremely difficult to ask the Governor to make any further unilateral gestures in the hope of moving the Chinese. We therefore reluctantly concluded that we should let matters take their course.
6. We have recently received indications from delicate sources in Hong Kong that the Chinese may indeed be contemplating the release of Mr. Grey shortly after Hsueh is released. They appear to be under some misapprehension however about the correct date when Hsueh is due out of prison with full remission. They have mentioned 20 October when in fact the date is 18 November. It would be most unfortunate if the Chinese were to have a change of mind because they thought that for some reason we were holding Hsueh beyond the time when he would normally be due for release. We are therefore pursuing with the Governor whether in view of the apparent misunderstanding and in order to speed up Mr. Grey's release, Hsueh could now be released on about 20 October and this presented as the normal date. If this is impossible, we have asked that the New China News Agency be informed of the correct date for release.
Far Eastern Department
15 October, 1968.
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