vary between two and four months.
If as a result Hong Kong had
to suspend the licensing of exports to the Community for some time, then the importers in the Community would suffer too. He would therefore prefer to see some means which would ensure a smooth transition from the old categorisation to the new.
He, too, hoped that there would be possibilities of preserving some of the flexibilities in the old categorisation by means of combining some categories in the new.
5.
Davignon accepted that both sides were in an unfortunate situation, but he saw his main task as stopping member states going the autonomous route. He would not
6.
a) have agreements for the sake of having agreements which he won't be able to live up to subsequently;
b) want the autonomous measures. Such would only favour those people who c uld afford not to live by
the rules. He thought that they would wreck the economic base of places such as Hong Kong and Singapore.
de could
Davignon considered the Commission and Hong Kong to be victims of the situation. Hong Kong for its success. The
Commission for having to take away what existed. understand Hong Kong's reluctance to go below 1976. But cut backs
would be essential unless Hong Kong felt that it could live with
autonomous measures for six months or so. He did not think so.
Even if Hong Kong should feel this way, it was his duty to prevent the introduction of autonomous measures.
7. He appreciated, too, Hong Kong's concern with the Americans. As he saw it, the US had had four easy years and they had no vested rights for this easy life to continue. From his general soundings of the American political scene, the US administration was bound to run into trouble with Congress and it would have mattered little even if the EEC had complied with all the wishes of the US
administration as far as its textile negotiations were concerned.
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