The policy of the Hong Kong Government has been to keep Hong Kong free of external political faction. Certain action has therefore been taken against those elements which have sought to make the Colony an arena for propagating their own political ideas. This has at times brought criticism, especially from the new government in Peking, which has objected to what it has chosen to describe as persecution and denial of democratic rights to Chinese in Hong Kong. It is nevertheless true that the cherished democratic freedoms which pertain to the British system of Government have been jealously guarded by the Hong Kong authorities. The only limitations on them have been those imposed through necessity of maintaining public order and preserving the security of the Colony. It has also been necessary to take measures to prevent interference with the educational system in the Colony in order to ensure that education remains what it should be, namely, training in good citizenship rather than indoctrination with one particular set of ideas. The activities of Chinese political dissidents have fortunately resulted in only one act of murder. General Yang Chieh, a Chinese official who had served as Chinese Ambassador in Moscow, and had later fallen out of sympathy with the Kuomintang regime was shot, presumably for political reasons. On account of the above activities, and their possibly dangerous effect on law and order in the Colony, an Ordinance was passed in May entitled the Societies Ordinance, declaring illegal all societies or organisations which had affiliations with political parties outside the Colony.
A further cause of difficulty and embarrassment to the Hong Kong Government arising out of the Chinese civil war had been the disposition of Chinese State-owned assets located in the Colony, which are now claimed by both the Nationalist and the Central People's Government. The case which has attracted most attention has been that of the Chinese airlines, the China National Aviation Corporation and the Central Air Transport Corporation. On the 9th November eleven aircraft belonging to these two companies defected and flew from Kai Tak airfield into Communist China, carrying the Managing Directors of both companies. At the same time the majority of the staff of the two companies in Hong Kong also declared themselves in favour of the Peking regime. The Nationalist authorities have since tried to establish their claim to obtain physical possession of the some 70 aircraft belonging to the two companies still remaining in the Colony. A further complication was added by the claim of two American citizens, Major-General Claire Chennault and Mr. Whiting Willauer to have purchased on December 12th the aircraft and assets of the two companies from the Chinese Nationalist Government. The case at the end of 1949 was still before the Courts, with Messrs. Chennault and Willauer
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