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BACKGROUND NOTE: HONG KONG
Annex A
The Colony of Hong Kong consists of four areas:-
(i) Hong Kong Island (29 square miles) ceded by
China to Great Britain in perpetuity under the
Treaty of Nanking, 1842.
(ii) A strip of land on the Kowloon Peninsula, with
a few small islands (about four square miles) ceded by the Peking Convention 1860. The New Territories (365 square miles) leased
to Great Britain for 99 years under the Peking
Convention 1898 (this includes the remainder of the islands).
(iii)
(iv) Included in (iii) above, the so-called "Walled City of Kowloon" (6 acres), an area in which, under the 1898 Convention, the Chinese retained
certain jurisdictional rights which we extinguished
in 1899. Our legal position is by no means clear
cut. The Chinese have repeatedly revived their
claim to jurisdiction, the last occasion being
in 1963.
2. Fopulation
The population of the Colony is about 3.8 million, of whom
98% are Chinese and predominantly Cantonese. About half of the
Chinese population have, or are entitled to, the status of
Citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies. Non-Chinese (including British Servicemen and families) number about 72,000. The natural rate of increase is 2-3% per annum.
3. About 50% of the population are below the age of twenty, giving rise to many social problems in such a concentrated urban area. The need to keep abreast of the social problems and this potential increase to the working population underline the importance of maintaining a high rate of growth in the economy.
4. The Economy
Hong Kong has no natural resources. Prior to 1950 its prosperity rested on the entrepot trade, principally with China. With the advent of the Communist Government in China and the
embargo on strategic exports to China at the time of the Korean
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