(b)
on the Legco Elections and moves towards a more
representative system. He went On to say that if
the intention was to "cast a mould" which would be taken
over by the Special Administrative Region Government, "this was not a nice thing on which to comment".
Xu said that to comment in public on constitutional change would be bad for relations between China and Britain and would have an adverse effect on Hong Kong. However Xu said that he could not rule out discussions
and exchanges of views between the UK and China on the political system in Hong Kong. He emphasised at
the same time that for the next twelve years, Hong Kong would be under British rule.
when first draft of
is published
36 is
/thinking of the
(c)
(d)
(e)
In response to a question about the likely form of Hong Kong's political system, Xu said that this was a matter for the Basic Law and that there would be an answer to the question in three years at the most.
If it was the British Government's intention to give the right of administration to the people of Hong Kong, this would violate the spirit of the Joint Declaration. The correct thing for the British to do was to return both sovereignty and administration to China; China would then transfer the administration to Hong Kong, since the Hong Kong people were Chinese. The Chinese Government was also afraid of change. This was why they had produced a promise of fifty years without change. This would be undermined if there were twelve years of large scale changes before 1997.
Xu hoped that the British Government would take note of developments on the Basic Law. It would be desirable if a way could be found of bringing the/two governments closer together. Co-operation along these lines would be in accordance with the spirit of the Joint Declaration.
CONFIDENTIAL
3