CONFIDENTIAL
wike Wa
Ms Major
Pasha
9410
paras
PS/Lord Caithness
ли
FROM:
DATE:
12 June 1991
CC:
Private Secretary
HK1020/3
Special Advisers
Sir J Coles
Mr Burns
Mr Davies, FED
2011-
Aw
Mr Cox, HKD
RAD
HK Taiwan.
Ron 2416.
TAIWAN: CALL BY THE RT HON JOHN MOORE MP, 11 JUNE
1. Mr Moore briefed Lord Caithness yesterday for half an hour on his visit last month to Taiwan at the invitation of the Taiwanese MFA.
2.
Mr Moore said that our policy towards Taiwan was in a mess. We were being left behind by our European competitors. Our interests were suffering accordingly. French, Italian and Irish Ministers had recently visited Taiwan. The Canadians had established direct air links. The French were well on the way to doing so. The Australians, Belgians and Germans were also taking steps in this direction. Mr Moore promised to give the details to Mr Rifkind, who he would be seeing shortly. Mr Moore said that he recognised the special difficulty in which Hong Kong placed us, but he asked whether we were really prepared to be left behind while all our European rivals upgraded their air links. The Taiwanese would be willing to disguise the links in any way necessary to assuage Chinese concerns. He understood that the Department of Transport had secured landing rights in Taipei, but that the FCO was blocking further progress. He also suspected that a result of the recession British Airways were less keen on developing a route than they had been in the past (he made no mention of Virgin).
3.
Mr Moore said that we all recognised the economic strength of Taiwan (huge reserves, high savings ratios, impressive growth rates, etc) and its strategic position in relation to the mainland market. The potential British trade with Taiwan was considerable. He would be advising the Boards on which he sat to invest there. He had been impressed by the number of major British companies now represented in Taiwan and by the size of their investments. But he was appalled that our own representation was so low-key. Mr Pointon (Head of the Anglo-Taiwan Trade Committee) was a good operator but did not
CONFIDENTIAL
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