DRAFT LETTER
Clifford Chance
LORRAIN OSMAN THE FOUR TELEGRAMS
Foreign & Commonwealth
Office
London SWIA 2AH
Telephone: 071-
I am writing in response to Carolyn Martin's letter of 12 August 1991 to Jonathan Ziegel which enclosed a draft letter which it is proposed to send to Mr Osman's solicitors, Messrs Eversheds. The purpose of this letter is to seek to persuade the Attorney General of Hong Kong that it is unnecessary as a matter of principle and undesirable as a matter of practice that this proposed action be taken.
I believe that we and the Hong Kong Government share the same view on the legal background to the current problem which is as follows:
On 10 April 1990, as part of his fourth application for habeas corpus, Mr Osman issued a Notice of Motion seeking an order for production (1) by the Hong Kong Government of documents set out in Schedule II to the Notice and (2) by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office of documents set out in Schedule II to the Notice. a copy of the Notice for ease of reference.
The FCO and the Hong Kong Government prepared public interest immunity certificates. The FCO certificate covered documents requested under Schedule II to the Notice of Motion. The Hong Kong Government's certificate covered documents requested under both Schedule I and Schedule II.
Both the Hong Kong Government and FCO compiled collections of documents from their files which came within the terms of the Motion and the documents were then listed in schedules to the public interest immunity certificates. Both the Hong Kong Government and the FCO gave a liberal interpretation to the phrase in paragraphs 2 and 3 of Schedule II to the Motion:
LP1ABA