PA
a6561
CONFIDENTIAL
Mr. Wilford
SECRET
Confrontation Prisoners in Hong Kong
In your report on your visit to East Asia of 4 May you recommended that we should continue to look closely at the possibility of hastening the release of confrontation prisoners in Hong Kong. Subsequently you asked me whether the publication of the 1970 Hong Kong Public Order (Amendment) Ordinance was relevant to this problem.
2. A report in the South China Morning Post of 20 February commenting on the Ordinance suggested that as amended it gave Communist prisoners convicted of serious offences the possibility of appeal and that people "erroneously" arrested during confrontation would have their sentences reviewed. This was certainly not the intention of the Ordinance, which is designed to clarify certain appeals procedures and to give additional protection to the public against the possibility of arrest from innocent involvement in circumstances which constituted an offence under the
original Ordinance. Those sentenced under the old Ordinance cannot benefit from the amended provisions. Secret sources have now reported that as a result of this misleading article local Communists are under the misapprehension that the Ordinance provides grounds for a further review of the sentences of prisoners possibly leading to their early release.
SECRET
CONFIDENTIAL
13.