cc Mr Laird
9 December 1971
J Hale Esq
Foreign & Commonwealth Office Commodities Department
Great George Street
S W 1
Ex 198
136
One confusing alement in the fuss yesterday morning about the Hong Kong draft press statement and letter seemed to be the fact that the FCO were dealing with the Hong Kong side in parallel with DTI. I hope you would agree that in this sort of discussion it is important that whoever is trying to run them from the UK side (in this case DTI) should be the sole channel of communication. Apart from the risk of muddle (not to mention personal embarrassment) duplication of channels is liable to give the liong Kong side an advantage in dealing with us. Perhaps we can try to avoid this at the next round.
P W RIDLEY
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