CONFIDENTIAL
Foreign and Commonwealth Office London SW1A 2AH
HKK 182/1
RECEIVLS C
Y NO. 41
14 JAN 1990
DISK OFFICER
Telephone 01-22 3184
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PA
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JJ
Your reference
Dr D C Wilson
Political Adviser
HONG KONG
Our reference HKK 182/1
Date
9 January 1980
Dear David,
REPLACEMENT FOR HONG KONG INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT
1. We were grateful to receive Hong Kong telegram No 56 which cleared up a number of points on this subject. You will by now have seen that the British press has also been interested, with articles in "The Times" of 4 January (by Richard Hughes) and the "Financial Times" of 5 January (by Philip Bowring). Bowring's article concentrates on proposals by "Hong Kong and foreign business interests" on the subject and reports the Civil Aviation Department's statement that they knew nothing of the scheme. Hughes went a good deal further and echoed the "South China Morning Post" in anticipating early agreement between China and HMG.
2. News Department have has some enquiries here and have stressed that any talk of an agreement or even of discussions with the Chinese are quite untrue. I took the same line with Miss Lee, the London stringer for the "Far Eastern Economic Review". She showed a good deal of interest in our attitude to the general development by the Chinese of economic projects in Guangdong. I said that these developments seemed very beneficial and likely to be helpful to Hong Kong, but I stressed that we knew of no plans to include an airport among them.
Jones
Dick
R D Clift
Hong Kong and General Department
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TJ B George Esq PEKING
D. M March Esq OBE British Trade Commission HONG KONG
CONFIDENTIAL
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