241193A7:21/7
Ms K Naylor ITP/la DTI
24 November 1993
80
United Kingdom Delegation to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
19 rue de Franqueville
75116 Paris
Telephone: 45 24 98 28 Facsimile: 45 24 98 37
Kerry,
OECD/HONG KONG
1.
HUB 091/3
20. 1993
My letter of 25 October to Andrew Wong (HK Office Geneva).
on the
2. I attach a copy of a letter of 19 November from the HK Permanent Representative to the GATT, Joseph Wong, to Keith MacInnes which itself covers HK's formal application
HK's formal application for observer status Trade Committee and Trade Committee Working Party (TCWP).
3. Keith MacInnes had lunch with Joseph Wong today after the latter had delivered the application to the Secretary General. Mr Wong confirmed that the Chinese authorities have been formally notified of the application. They are not expected to react.
4.
The application will be referred by Council (hopefully next month) to the Trade Committee for a technical opinion at the 16/17 February meeting and may go to the TCWP before then if the Secretariat feels that two bites at that particular cherry are necessary. We see the technical case for as clearcut. It will then be up to Council to look at the political questions arising from the application, especially what happens after 1997 vis a vis China which continues to preoccupy some of the smaller members (notably the Swiss to whom Joseph Wong is himself planning to speak in Berne).
5. Nevertheless, we believe that the ground has been as well prepared as possible and it only remains now for the bureaucratic process, which we shall monitor carefully, to get under way.
aus са
Alastair Newton
CC:
I Ruff Esq ERD, FCO HKD, FCO
FED, FCO
H L1 Daies Esq Hong Kong