FEC 175/1.
CONFIDENTIAL
01
-
233 - 5542
Foreign and Commonwealth Office
London SW1A 2AH
A J Pryor Esq
Department of Trade The Adelphi
John Adam Street
LONDON WC2N 6BQ
Dear Arthur
UK/CHINA BILATERAL MARITIME AGREEMENT
2 February 1979
[FEL 175/1
INDLY
19 FEB 1979
Luke
1. Please refer to your letter FSR 3164/6 of 5 January about this agreement and the possibility of associating our interest in the development of shipping services to China with the growing commercial opportunities in China.
We were in fact on the point of sending you a detailed reply setting. out considered FCO views in the light of the comments (which) you will have seen) from Hong Kong and Peking to the points set out in your very full and helpful letter of 7 August,
2.
Since then, as you know, collective thinking in Whitehall has turned more in the direction of trying to reach, in the context of the Economic Cooperation Agreement (ECA) which we hope that Mr Varley will sign during his forthcoming visit to China, some sort of understanding that both the British and Chinese shipping fleets would have a reasonable share in carrying our bilateral trade (FCO telno 66 of 19 January to Peking). In this agreed telegram it was acknowledged that there were likely to be difficulties over Hong Kong which might prevent the con- clusion of the Maritime Agreement itself. The interim reactions which we have had from the Chinese both to the ECA itself (the Chinese draft includes a reference to shipping), and to our specific proposal on shipping lead us to believe that this is the right way to proceed, at any rate in the first instance.
In
the light of what the Chinese agree in the ECA and, perhaps in the light of the way in which our shipping industry is subsequently successful in exploiting whatever is agreed, we might turn to the wider issues raised by the Maritime Agreement.
3. I hope that you will regard this as a more constructive line than my sending you a definitive reply on the question of the Agreement itself at this stage. This would inevitably, I think, have had to take a negative line.
Cc: Mr Morland MAED
Mr Priston, CRE4/DOT
ди
سد
RC Samuel
Livel
Far Eastern Dept