CODE 18-77
Reference
(229)
Mr Evans
MAED
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HKCISI
CITES: AFRICAN ELEPHANT PROPOSAL
1.
We spoke briefly about DOE's draft submission on the proposal to move African elephants from Appendix II to Appendix I, sent under cover of Mr Muchmore's letter of 18 August to Mr Hughes.
2.
As I shall not be able to attend next week's meeting to discuss the draft paper, I should be grateful if you would feed in the following comments on the text:
para 9: the fourth sentence should be re-worded to reflect the language already agreed in the draft Community text: "We, France, Denmark, and the Netherlands maintain that where the interests of an overseas territory are deemed to be distinct and significant, we should be able to vote and speak seperately on their behalf."
para 10: I find it difficult to understand the argument leading to the conclusion that "the logical course of action in this instance would be to abstain". It is, of course, correct to highlight the fact that we have a responsibility to consider Hong Kong's interests, particularly at a time when confidence in the British Government's readiness to do so generally is at an all-time low. As I see it, we will only have a problem if British interests (which I assume will match the EC's) and Hong Kong's diverge. If we considered that Hong Kong had valid economic reasons for opposing/supporting the eventual proposal and these reasons were deemed to outweigh UK environmental interests, we should surely vote in favour of Hong Kong's position. I don't see why we would look ridiculous if we spoke for/against a proposal (from a UK standpoint) and then voted against/for it if we explained clearly that we were doing so on behalf of Hong Kong. In my view, we should avoid abstaining since the underlying assumption behind the need to depart from the agreed Community position is to represent (ie support) the overseas territory's interests. If these interests are deemed to be "distinct and significant", that clearly implies the need for a definite vote either for or against whatever proposal emerges.
3. Finally, since the Community text on overseas territories is unlikely to be adopted before the CITES Conference, we would need to confirm (through UKRep) that the Commission were content to apply the arrangement on a provisional basis at this meeting (as they agreed to do for a recent ITU Conference, though in the event it was not invoked).
Ка
R W Kyles
ECD (E)
E111 270 2291
23 August 1989
cc: Ms R Anderson, Cabinet office
Mr Speller (with LUR)
RWKAKV/1
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