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Hong Kong & General Department Foreign & Commonwealth Office
King Charles Street
LONDON SW1A 2AH
From the Director
174
orchestra menter
44318
The British Library
SCIENCE REFERENCE LIBRARY
25 Southampton Buildings, Chancery Lane
London WC2A 1AW
Telephone 01-405 8721 EXT: 3168
Telex 266959
our ref
MWH/BEB/FID 1
your ref
Ник
345/2
date
29 July 1982
Dear Sir
See (175)
I am writing to seek your help in a serious situation which has arisen over the admission of delegates and officials to a set of international meetings being held in Hong Kong between
6 and 16 September 1982. In brief, one of the members of the Council of the International Federation for Documentation
(Dr P Lazar) has been refused a visa to visit Hong Kong. We do not know the reason but our national member in Hong Kong under- stands it may be because Dr Lazar is from Hungary and it is, therefore, likely that visas will also be refused for other East Bloc nationals. If so, it will considerably embarrass the United Kingdom national member of FID (the organisation Aslib) and also the British Library since I am a senior officer of FID. I think we shall have no alternative but to recommend cancelling the meetings and if that happened it would cause not only the usual crop of problems but would possibly upset the Chinese who have arranged some official post-Congress tours of establishments in Peking and Guangzhou.
180
In case you are not familiar with the organisation FID, I attach a copy of a brief descriptive leaflet, a photocopy of part of its statutes, a list of the present officers and a copy of the Congress brochure. FID is an NGO with Category A observer status with UNESCO and consultative relations with many other members of the UN family.
The refusal of a visa to Dr Lazar cannot, I feel certain, be on personal grounds. He is a very highly respected international figure, for a long time a member of UNIDO, and has always been persona grata in Western European countries. He is now retired though still active in FID. The Chief Executive of the British Library, Sir Harry Hookway, with whom I have discussed the situation, has known Dr Lazar for many years and agreed that there could be no personal grounds for refusing him a visa. I am sure Mr JC Gray of the Office of Arts and Libraries (who incidentally will be a speaker at the Congress) would also confirm Dr Lazar's standing.
183
The Science Reference Library is a Department of the Reference Division of the British Library.