ACEAKC
НКВ 012/1
2
(Faxed to HIC)
Enter
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Mr
wood, HKD
evisiv
CONFIDENTIAL
FROM P Fifoot
Legal Advisers
DATE : 9 June 1989
CC
Mr McLaren
Mr Paul, HKD
Mr Footman, HKD
Mr Edwards, Legal Advisers
113
BRIEF NOTES ON THREE CURRENT ISSUES RELATING TO THE DRAFT BASIC LAW
1. These notes are written on the following assumptions:-
(a) that Hong Kong will return to China in 1997. (The options, temporary or otherwise, which might exist if China were in anarchy
or the throes of a widespread civil war at that time need to be considered separately). The Joint Declaration is, therefore, the only formal restriction on how SAR is to be governed after that
date.
(b) that when contacts and negotiations on the draft Basic Law
are resumed, they will be resumed generally in the light of the
Joint Declaration and the present draft of the Basic Law, and that
the Chinese approach to the Basic law will not have changed
substantially. (This should not prevent attempts being made to make
changes on particular aspects of the draft Basic Law including any proposals prompted by the present situation in China).
(c) that whatever regime emerges in Peking, the Chinese approach to democracy on the mainland will not be that of full universal
suffrage. This will inevitably have consequences for what the
Chinese, when enacting the Basic Law in the next year or so, will be
prepared to contemplate for Hong Kong over the next ten to twenty
years.
CONFIDENTIAL
งา