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QUEEN ANNE'S GATE LONDON SWIH 9AT question of
me I MacCTS, ECO
个
mr Taylor
Eurasians
as chinese.
146
29 May 1990
Why the delay
oday?
in reaching as
Thank you for your letters of 19 April and 15 May enclosing this correspondence from Mr Eric Ho, President of the Welfare League, on behalf of the Eurasian community in Hong Kong. I am taking this opportunity to reply also to the letter which Mr Ho sent to Peter Lloyd on 28 April.
Mr Ho fears that Eurasians might not be regarded by the People's Republic of China as being fully Chinese and might be subject to possible discrimination after 1997. For this reason, and because of hereditary links with the United Kingdom, he considers that those Eurasians who claim to be direct descendants of Britons should be registrable as British citizens under the British Nationality (Hong Kong) Bill outside the 50,000 ceiling.
I cannot, of course, comment Chinese nationality law, but if Eurasians were not to be considered to be "Chinese", they would benefit from the same safeguards available to members of other non-Chinese ethnic minorities in Hong Kong. The Sino-British Joint Declaration and the Basic Law makes explicit provision for non-Chinese people to have right of abode in the special administrative region of Hong Kong. Furthermore, the Government has already taken steps to reassure the ethnic minorities in Hong Kong about their position after 1997 by providing for the children and grandchildren of former British Dependent Territory citizens who are born after 1997 to acquire British Overseas citizenship if they would otherwise be stateless. Beyond that, British nationals have the specific Parliamentary assurance, given on a number of occasions, that if, against all expectation, any solely British national with no claim to Chinese nationality came under severe pressure to leave Hong Kong, the Government of the day would be expected to consider with considerable and particular sympathy their case for admission to the United Kingdom. We stand by that assurance.
In drawing up the Bill which is presently before Parliament, we considered representations from a wide body of opinion, both here and in Hong Kong, about the scope of our proposals, the extent of eligibility, and whether specific provision should be made for particular groups. The views of those representing the non-ethnic Chinese minorities were given particular consideration but it was considered neither-appropriate nor necessary for any special measures to be made for them.
TCD 3402.
RECEIV
2 0 JUL 1990
The Rt Hon Sir Peter Blaker, KCMG., MP.
House of Commons
LONDON, S.W.1.
INC
/over...