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impracticalities of that line of argument. However, they were told that their concerns would be passed on to the Home Office.
(iii) Human rights in Hong Kong after 1997
(iv)
HURD
The delegation made a strong plea for Britain to ensure that there would be effective guarantees in place before 1997, so that existing human rights in Hong Kong would be secured. The Secretary of State agreed we had a responsibility to do what we could; there were guarantees in the Joint Declaration and we would do our best to see that they were implemented. This process was ongoing.
The airport
The ADPL are keen to see the airport go ahead and referred to various ideas on financing which, they said, had been received sympathetically by the Chinese leaders they had met during their recent visit to Peking, eg making use of the SAR Land Fund before 1997: very flexible interpretation of the MOU to permit borrowing for non-core projects: raising equity by issuing Low interest rate. bonds to the Hong Kong public. They were told that we too would like to see progress. If the Chinese were indeed. prepared to be more flexible we would welcome it and be ready to respond.
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