BE BEIJING CRYPIEK
COUNSELLOR
CONFIDENTIAL
SO)
ps/ Mr Goodlad
WED 16 JUN 93 15:18
PG.02
2 suggest
R Ravis Hh?
01214
suggest puce ato to Pslih Goodluck
RECEIVED IN ^*~ISTRY
JJ JUN 1993
ESKC
معلی را
c: (by fax)
Sir J Coles
Mi Bunten
A
зра
fhr Whitney
Cro 12/
M616
Mr Morris, HKD, FCO
Mr Ashton, DPA, Hong Kong Mr Ricketts (visiting) Mr Ehrman (visiting)
JARDINES
REGISTRY Action Taken
CC
1.
Sir Charles Powell came to breakfast on 11 June, to run over the ground before embarking on his calls on Vice-Foreign Minister Jiang Enzhu; HKMO Deputy Director wang giren (who saw him with three others, including Chen Zuoer; and the Director of the Hong Kong and Macao division of MOFTEC, a Mr An. He telephoned on the evening of 11 June to give me an account of how these calls had gone.
2. Sir Charles said that he had made the same carefully prepared pitch to each of his interlocutors. He had stressed that Jardines was engaged in business not politics; that the firm was committed to Hong Kong and the stablity and prosperity of the territory; that they believed that Hong Kong's future lay with China; and that on the constitutional issues they wanted to see an agreement between Britain and China on the basis of the Joint Declaration and the Basic Law (Sir Charles did not refer to the third of the "compliances" but perhaps he mentioned that too).
3.
All these points were noted down carefully, and sir Charles was told that the chinese would consider them and take them into account. Wang giren (and I think the other two interlocutors) said that Jardines were welcome to go on doing business in Hong Kong and China, both before and after 1997. But Sir Charles's references to the notorious anti-Jardines directive were, unsurprisingly, ignored. Sir Charles said that it would be a pity if this became public, since it ran counter to obligations that china had undertaken in talks with the EC, and was inconsistent with the GATT. Jardines themselves would not of course leak the document since it was damaging to them, but it seemed to have been widely disseminated and might easily get out. only the MOFTEC man made an indirect response, saying at one point that China had had to respond to the feelings of Chinese companies who had reacted badly to an NCNA article
(about Jardines) in December.
4.
Sir Charles said he had raised CT9 with wang giren, and had got from him only a statement that there was a need to be fair to all companies, and that franchises going