BY BAG
布政司署
CONFIDENTIAL
116
COLONIAL SECRETARIAT
LOWER ALBERT ROAD
HONG KONG
香港下亞
畢道
**** Our Ref.:
(103) in CR 22/2091/74
632317
р
wrang A
* YOUR Ref.:
C.S. 41A
R B CROWSON ESQ
1XK14/5
HONG KONG AND INDIAN OCEAN DEPT F C 0.
uta
15th July 1974
We must await
Jurite advice
This is relevant
fulta drafts you were fultry up.
2.1. how
22/17
ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS FROM SOUTH VIETNAM
Dear Jick,
Many thanks for letting us have the copy of the letter to the Minister of State from Robert McLennan M.P. as a result of the approach from Hastings & Co. here.
2. I assume that you have not been expecting any comments on it, particularly since the despatch of our telegrams Nos. 735 and 736 to you and para. 4 of our telegram No. 14 to Saigon, all of which bring the story up to date and amplify the assurances given in Hong Kong. Your suggested response seems fine.
3. I understand that the Director of Immigration has recently been in touch with Tracy, who has told him privately that he was acting on behalf of the relatives of Li Kit and that he has no other interest. beyond the purely professional, in the case. The account which I have had from Bill Collard of this discussion led me to believe that Tracy will not be expecting any extensive response from his appeal to the Members of Parliament, particularly as the removal of the group was effected after he had written.
4. The press, however, are continuing to show an interest in this case and in the whole question of the assurances from the South Vietnamese Government. The journalists are no doubt sore, out of sympathy with their eleven colleagues who were fined $200 each with conviction recorded for breaking into the restricted area at Kai Tak airport on the night when the 118 were removed to South Vietnam. The eleven journalists have appealed against the sentence of the Magistrate but, until the appeal is heard, I would expect the press to continue to press hard on the matter of assurances, if only to prove to their readership that the matter was of sufficient burning public interest to cause the eleven to break the airport rules in the interests of their profession. Until the trial of the group is out of the way in Saigon there is unlikely to be any respite.
CONFIDENTIAL
/ We