Dolland (F.E. Dept.)
CONFIDENTIAL
MACAU
The Portuguese Ambassador called on Mr. Hohler
at 5 p.m. today in order to give him further information which he had just received from Lisbon in connection with the questions which I had put to him on 14 January. 4
As regards our general inquiry about the negotiations with the Chinese, the Ambassador said that his Government were obviously unable to summarise for us all the developments and talks which had taken place over the last six weeks. But they could summarise the present situation by saying that the difficulty now arose from Chinese insistence
J
on the Portuguese Government publicly accepting the Chinese account of the incidents which had taken place, This account embodied humiliating formulae and placed the exclusive responsibility for what had happened on the Portuguese Government.
6
b. The Ambassador explained that so far as the claims and requests advanced by the Chinese were concerned, some of which were well-founded, the Portuguese Government saw no difficulty. They could accept the substance of these. But the formulae proposed by the Chinese were incompatible with the dignity of the Portuguese nation and could not be accepted.
The Portuguese Government believe that H. 1. Government would realise that it must be for the former to judge when they should initiate the use of the facilities which they had requested,
The
$. The Ambassador said that he was now informed that the numbers of people involved would not be excessive. Portuguese Government could not make a precise estinate, but they thought it most likely that only a few hundred persons would be involved. (The Ambassador subsequently referred to a possible upper limit of a thousand or two - see below). Portuguese Government would accept the whole financial responsibility with regard to these people, and accepted responsibility for arranging their onward transport from Hong
Kong.
-6.
The
The Ambassador said that we would realise that the Portuguese Covernment could not leave preparations to the last moment, when a dangerous situation would have been reached or would be imminent. The Portuguese Government confidently hoped that the presence of a few hundred extra people
(or perhaps at the most a thousand or two) for a few days in
CONFIDENTIAL
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