CONFIDENTIAL
Conclusion
gone
Apart
12. As I see it we have, for the time being at least, about as far as we can with this particular exercise. from getting the French to notify to the GATT their restrictions on the two Hong Kong products, it has not apparently led to any concrete results in the short run. But I never expected the walls of Jericho to fall with one blast (or even two). The point is that the whole of the GATT are now aware of Hong Kong's complaints against France and the position is on the record. I have no doubt also that the Commission representatives have been, taking reasonably full notes of the proceedings. I therefore do not think it has done any harm to raise the issues factually and coolly in the forum of the GATT in this way and that to have done so may in the longer run be of assistance. Despite what has been said, also, I think that some of the French have been rather surprised that the Hong Kong worm has turned in this fashion. I am not going so far as to claim definitely that Colmant is wrong when he says that we will achieve more in bilateral talks behind closed doors. But the fact is that we have been conducting these talks with the French regularly for a number of years now without achieving very much in the way of practical results. Obviously nice cosy ret-togethers in private are much more comfortable for the French than dragging the matter into the open in a committee room of the alais des Nations. But now that we have shown that, when the proper occasion arises, HMG and the Hong Kong Government are prepared to do just that it may be that the French will begin to treat the issue a little more seriously than they have done hitherto.
DJCJ/mms
Distribution:
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Director, Hong Kong (3 copies)
A.L.; A.B.
Mr. J.G. Morris (Board of Trade, CRE1) Mr. H. Stewart (Hong Kong Dept., F.C.Ó.)
Mr. R. Abbott (UKMIS, Geneva)
Mr. B.H. Wilcox (British Embassy, Paris)
CONFIDENTIAL