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3. Mr. Goldsmith has not been inactive. He had a long talk
with Mr. Tran of the Commission in January, during which
Mr. Tran emphasised that the U.K. should exert political
pressure which should be especially directed to changing the
French opposition. He subsequently spoke to Miss Guyot of the Fränch Delegation in Geneva and clearly argued Hong Kong'
case strongly. There have, however, been no concrete results,
so far at least.
4. The position now reached is that Mr. Hannay in Brussels
continues to argue that an approach: to the member states as
well as to the Commission should be made and very soon if we
are to exert any influence. I have made no progress whatever
in putting the argument to the Board of Trade Department
concerned that even if representations were unlikely to
produce effective results, we should not fail to use weapons
at our disposal and should, moreover, have regard to the
need ministers might have to say that we had made representations, if Hong Kong were in the end excluded by the Community and if questions were raised in the House.
Mr. Goldsmith obviously handles this question personally and
hes a great deal more information than is available to us.
Hong Kong Department are satisfied that Mr. Goldsmith is well informed as to the Hong kong position, but I am myself uneasy that we continue not to take action on Mr.Hannay's advice. I suggest therefore that you might discuss this whole matter
with
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