the Galway
224)
J N Powell Esq Hong Kong Dept
FCO
CONFIDENTIAL
Mr Layden $3/2
useful confinita of
Russins in China. Doubt but it will lulp our love in
British Embassy
PEKING
23 January 1986
in JZq
"Though.
f.
34
HKM 04014
RECEIVED IN REGISTRY
4FEB 1986
Dear Jafethan,
STATELESSNESS
1.
DESK OFFICER INDEX
PA
REGISTRY Action Taken
You probably recall that at the last JLG, during discussion of this subject, David Wilson asked the Chinese what had happened in 1949 to communities of White Russians or Indians then living in China. After a bit of muttering among them- selves, the Chinese told us that they had "basically all left" China.
2.
I was therefore interested to see the enclosed snippet in a recent edition of China Daily, which suggests that the situation is not as simple as that. Clearly there are minority communities living in parts of China and the Chinese must have found some way of dealing with (or shelving) the question of their nationality. The example of Russians in Xinjiang is one that we could perhaps mention in seeking further information from the Chinese about their attitude to the non-Chinese minorities in Hong Kong.
CC:
RP Margolis Esq DPA, Hong Kong
Yours ever,
Tom
TW M Smith
CONFIDENTIAL