CONFIDENTIAL
LORD PRIVY SEAL'S VISIT TO CHINA
: 4 TO 8 JANUARY 1982
BRIEF NO CHINA 2: HONG KONG/CHINA ISSUES
Points to Make
Hong Kong/China Relations in General
1. Pleased with the general state of relations. Good co-operation in number of fields, notably economic and immigrations. continue. Glad Hong Kong Visa Office now functioning.
Immigration from China into Hong Kong
2. Illegal Immigration
Hope this will
Grateful for Chinese co-operation in reducing number of illegal immigrants. Hope efforts to deter illegal immigration, especially by children, will be maintained.
3. Legal Immigration
Numbers are still too high. Big increase in proportion of visitors from China holding one-way travel permits. Hope Chinese authorities will react favourably to proposals by Hong Kong to keep down numbers. 4. Transit Visas (Defensive)
Glad new arrangements have been introduced.
Hope they are working well. Place of issue of visas is different problem. Administrative burden of issuing visas in Peking would be impossibly heavy for embassy. British visa offices are now authorised to grant double journey transit visas for Hong Kong for Chinese passport holders. Should make things easier. [If pressed] But officials can discuss
this further.
5. Alleged Maltreatment (Defensive)
It is not Hong Kong Government policy to maltreat anyone or discriminate against Chinese citizens. All cases brought to our attention have been and will be seriously investigated. But we could only investigate specific cases.
Official Chinese Representative in Hong Kong (Defensive)
6. Present arrangements work well. Should avoid changes which might affect confidence in Hong Kong. [If pressed] Could be considered
CONFIDENTIAL
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