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The Asian Wall Street Journal carried a Beijing report of 6 May saying China and France had agreed "in principle" for France to build four 900-megawatt nuclear reactors in two Chinese power stations, quoting President Mitterrand. French diplomats had said France's Framatome S.A. expected to supply the reactors for the Guangdong plant, while Britain's G.E.C. expected to supply the turbines. There was no mention of the second power station to be built at an undisclosed location in eastern China.
HK Belongers' Association: The SCMP reported on 4 May that the Chinese Government was to seek opinions from the HK Belongers' Association_over the 1997 issue; the article said it was learned that "someone very high up and powerful" would meet members of the association during a visit to HK in two months, but the vice-chairman of the association, Mr. Sze Chusian, said it was not yet known who the official was. Mr. Sze said the association was approached by a "Chinese source" to make arrangements for the meeting. The association's stance was that stability and prosperity could only be maintained after 1997 if (1) the judiciary was absolutely independent; (2) the free enterprise system remained intact; (3) there was freedom of speech; (4) there was no control of currency exchange; (5) people had freedom to choose their own jobs; (6) residents had freedom to travel and migrate; (7) those who worked hardest received the most reward; and (8) the liberties of citizens were respected and protected.
Education_report: The editorial in the SCMP on 8 May was about the recent report by the international panel of education experts and said in the light of the drastic changes in HK's outlook for the future after 1997 it was worth considering whether the panel's five-point plan for expanding education in the years ahead was not out of tune with the times. As the panel noted in their report their starting point for the whole exercise was based on the assumption that HK would continue to be an open society, with freedom of the individual to choose within his or her range of ability, achievement and opportunity. These assumptions might have been valid last Spring and the proposals from which they stemmed welcomed as realistic goals; but in the light of what had happened since, were these assumptions not too optimistic? The panel argued that China could not afford to reduce the emphasis being given to English, especially since China had given the teaching of English a high priority. This was especially so since HK's future was clearly intimately linked with China's, the panelists noted. But like most people at that time they perhaps did not realise just how close that day was. Unfortunately, although we had had a number of assurances from many Chinese "leaders" at a variety of levels on a wide range of areas, there had been little indication, if any, of what language Beijing had in mind, particularly in the realms of education, once it had regained sovereignty. But if the status quo was to remain largely intact, surely English must retain the prominence it enjoyed today. No doubt this was an area where Beijing would have the biggest problem in wrestling with its constitutional conscience, because it would have to come to a compromise between making the mother tongue THE language and facing the reality that HK was what it was because of its ability to communicate with the rest of the world. Beijing's leadership today was sufficiently pragmatic to realise that Mandarin was not the vehicle for this, but in 1997 who knew?
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