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GOVERMENT HOUSE HONG KONG.
WED 03 NOV 93 04:48
Office of The Political Adviser
10
PG.02
布政司署
香港下亞厘毕道
GOVERNMENT SECRETARIAT
CONFIDENTIAL AND PERSONAL
LOWER ALBERT ROAD
HONG KONG
* Our Ref.:
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MUCD 02117 Co S. J. Cl
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CO Hum Esq INUE.
AUSS
F CO
18 NOV 1993
Do Rubitt (th)
3 November 1993
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Dear Christopher
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CANADIAN PROPOSAL FOR MULTILATERAL MEETING ON HONG KONG
1.
I had lunch yesterday with the Canadian and New Zealand Commissioners and the US and Australian Consuls- General. The Canadian, John Higginbotham, said that an idea was taking shape in Canadian minds to have a meeting "at the Winston Lord level" of the countries represented round the lunch table, plus Japan. The subject of the meeting would be Hong Kong. Higginbotham said that the Canadians did not at the moment have any particular objectives in mind; but they felt that we were getting to the point where it would be useful to have an exchange on the whole range of matters involving Hong Kong. He mentioned air service agreements as the kind of thing that Canada would be interested in discussing in addition to the main political questions. Australia and New Zealand immediately welcomed the idea enthusiastically. The US Consul-General and I, both thinking immediately of the recent Chevening meeting (though not of course mentioning it), took a more cautious line. I said that we of course welcomed opportunities to brief our friends about Hong Kong and exchange views but I would need to think very carefully about holding a multilateral meeting to discuss Hong Kong. If the Chinese got to hear of it it would confirm their worst suspicions about internationalisation. I also thought that the Japanese would
be wary of an exercise which carried that risk.
2.
Richard Mueller, the US Consul-General, took a similar line and raised some doubt about whether Winston Lord would be able to take time off for a meeting specifically about Hong Kong. He asked whether there might be a meeting of Asia Directors on other matters, onto which a Hong Kong meeting