布政司署
畢道
香港下亞
*** OUR REF.: TSX 2/82
來阻檔號 YOUR REF.:
N. J. Cox, Esq.,
FED
FCO.
Dear Nigel,
SECRET
Noted
a312.
GOVERNMENT SECRETARIAT
LOWER ALBERT ROAD
HONG KONG
21 January 1983
see (az
LUCK 040/1
3 1 JAN 1983
INDEX
...
Afzz h
Future of Hong Kong:
Development of Chinese Attitudes 1979-82
Lamms
N/R.
Please refer to your letter of 23 December and the papers enclosed with it. Bob Peirce, who is in Hong Kong on a bag run has not yet received your letter. He will be commenting on return to Peking. My own comments relate principally to the conclusions rather than the chronology.
2.
I think the paper should make greater allowance for the possibility that the Chinese position expounded to the Prime Minister and subsequently largely leaked through the press, may be an opening negotiating stance. There are parallels with their tactics in the negotiations with the Americans over/sales to Taiwan.
The paper ought perhaps to bring out that Taiwan remains a more important problem politically for the Chinese, not least because they do not have the straightforward take-over option which they do have in the case of Hong Kong. The cause of peaceful reunification with Taiwan would be set back a very long way if Chinese actions over Hong Kong undermined the credibility of their nine-point proposal to Taiwan.
3.
The references to the Macau solution in the paper seem to me to require further elaboration. The Macau solution was never really a viable option for Hong Kong, whatever noises the Chinese may have made in that direction. The essence of the Macau solution is that the Chinese and Portuguese positions can subsist happily side by side because there is no time limit and therefore no requirement for public agreement. The Portuguese have never publicly admitted recognising Chinese sovereignty over Macau, although everyone believes that they did so privately. 1997 requires that a degree of visible overlap between the Chinese and British positions be achieved. The solution which the Chinese have rejected, at least as an opening gambit, is not therefore the Macau solution but that of a concession on titular sovereignty in exchange for continuing British administration
SECRET
14.