CONFIDENTIAL
HKK 02715
RECEIVED
05 FEB 1986
DESK OFFICES. INDEX
PA
AB 3/2
RF
C&
.186
:Y
uken
From:
T Renton
Date:
29 January 1986
Secretary of State
CC:
All Ministers PUS
Sir W Harding
Dr Wilson
SEAD
FED
(HKD)
News Department
VISIT TO CHINA, HONG KONG AND THAILAND
1.
I have just returned from ten days spent in China, Hong Kong and Thailand.
There
China 2.
I found an atmosphere of friendship in Peking. was no sign of the tension created by the off-the-cuff remarks of Hong Kong Officials and Unofficials on constitutional change and by Premier Zhao's feeling that the concern he had reflected on this issue twice last year to the Prime Minister had not been picked up and acted on. It was perhaps significant that Zhou Nan said in one of his after dinner speeches that our political relations had been strengthened by the conclusion of the Guangdong agreement.
3. Ji Peng Fei, who had reputedly got out of a hospital
bed to see me, stressed that both sides were implementing the Joint Declaration scrupulously. The only specific Chinese complaint was about the Hong Kong Government's handling of the Kowloon City problem and the fact that Officials there were getting involved in a Chinese domestic matter. Yet even this complaint seemed more for the record and once Zhao had got it off his chest, there appeared to be a readiness to work out practical details between the Hong Kong Government and the NCNA, subject to final decisions being taken in the Joint Liaison Group. All in all, as the Ambassador said, the mood music was good in conversations with Zhao, Ji Peng Fei and Wu.
4,
There seemed also to be genuine pleasure at General Secretary Hu Yao Bang's invitation from the Prime Minister to visit the UK, and great excitement at the prospect of the Queen's visit. There is of course an inherent interest in and respect for royal dynasties in China.
CONFIDENTIAL
116