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the case since, apart from the emergency regulations, the law
is consistent with the Convention.
7.
We have considered whether we can explain in Parliament
the specific reasons why the Convention cannot be extended to
Hong Kong. Such explanations have been given by countries
where there were no political reasons for not doing so. But
in the case of Hong Kong, public discussion of the emergency
regulations, of the unwillingness of China to accept deportees,
and of the existence or absence of a threat to the nation,
would certainly affect confidence. This implies that we must
avoid detailed discussion of the point in Parliament.
8. Mr Grieve may go on to claim, in the light of Mr Beard's
case, that whether or not the substantive rights of the individual
are protected in Hong Kong, the absence of a power to petition
the European Commission of Human Rights is itself a deprivation
of rights. The facts of Mr Beard's case are described in the
attached background paper which was prepared for the Prime Minister
in 1969. We should, however, try to a void getting involved in
these personal details in Parliament in the answer to this
general PQ. We are already in correspondence with Mr Grieve,
and Mr Royle promised to contact him again when our current
investigations were complete. On the general point, however,
the right of petition to the European Commission is not an
inevitable result of the extension of the Convention to
For example, the Convention extends,
particular territories.
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