Y
53852/49
HONG KONG
NO.
SECRET
53
10
COLONIAL OFFICE,
The Church House,
Great Smith Street,
London, S.W.1.
/qNovember,
Jovember, 1949.
Sir,
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I have the honour to inform you that during the course of the meetings of the Special Committee on information transmitted under Article 75 (e) of the United Nations Charter, held at Lake Success in August and September, the Chinese Delegate, Mr. Li, made certain observations on behalf of his Government relating to sovereignty in Kowloon and the New Territories and the transmission of information to the United Nations under Article 73 (e) of the Charter in respect of those territories.
2. Early in the proceedings of the Special Committee, when the list of territories in respect of which information is transmitted was being reviewed, Mr. Li called attention to a Secretariat paper before the Committee (General Assembly document A/915/Add. 1 of the 22nd August, 1949, a copy of which is enclosed as Annex I to this despatch) in which it was stated that, whereas in 1946 the United States had tentatively included the Panama Canal Zone in the list of non-self-governing territories under its administration, the Government of Panama had in the same year contested the inclusion of the Canal Zone in that list on the grounds that the territory could not be considered as non-sclf-governing and that sovereignty over it rested in the Government of Panama. In view of this contention, the United States have not transmitted information on the Canal Zone in 1947 or 1948, but reserved its own position and stated that the matter was subject to consultation between the two governments. Mr. Li observed that if the fact that sovereignty over a territory did not rest in the administering authority was regarded as a sufficient reason for ceasing to transmit information in respect of that territory, "the Committee should take note of that fact with respect of Kowloon and the New Territories" since "sovereignty over Kowloon and the New Territories was vested in the Republic of China".
I enclose as Annex II to this despatch a copy of an extract from the Summary Records of the proceedings of the Special Committee on the 26th August, 1949 containing Mr. Li's remarks.
3. The United Kingdom Representative reserved his Government's position on this question, and both Mr. Li's remark and the United Kingdom reservation were recorded in the Rapporteur's report which was adopted by the Committee. On the day following the adoption of that report, however, when the Committee had already dispersed, a corrigendum to
/the
GOVERNOR
SIR ALEXANDER GRANTHAM, K.C.M.G.
etc.,
etc.,
etc.