Mr Allen Lee (in Chinese): Mr President, a question for the Governor. According to the Director of Audit's Report for the UNHCR, it owes Hong Kong $1 billion and some reports say that it is hard for it to repay the money. Now according to past agreement with the UNHCR, is it true that for other countries like the Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia, which have boat people, is the arrangement similar? If not, why is it that Hong Kong will have this particular arrangement about repayment? The UNHCR's problem is such that our money perhaps can't be repaid in the foreseeable future. So how shall we deal with that? Is it true that there is a kind of dereliction of duty on the part of officials?
Governor: No, I don't believe there has been any dereliction of duty. The Council, some Members more clearly than others, will recall that the Hong Kong Government entered into a memorandum of understanding with the UNHCR in 1988 which governed the financial contributions and the financial arrangements between the two parties. That's the basis for the unfortunate debt which is owed at the moment. I can't speak for what precise arrangements were made with other countries in the region, but if they were different I would be as interested as the honourable gentleman but I wasn't, as he'll recall, here in 1988, whereas others were. It's important I think for us to recognise that the UNHCR undertakes to make good the money which it owes Hong Kong and that point was made clear, once again, as recently as September and we will continue to argue the point with the UNHCR because a billion dollars is a very large amount of money for us to be owed.
Mr Allen Lee (in Chinese): The problem is this. OK we signed an understanding with the UNHCR, a memorandum but the Hong Kong people didn't know that that understanding didn't have legal force. Now they know that it doesn't have legal force. That's why I say there might be dereliction of duty because the Administration didn't tell the Hong Kong people, didn't tell the Council, that that memorandum didn't have legal force so you can't prosecute the UNHCR. They don't have the money and it can't be helped, so this is the crux of the matter.
Governor: I don't think that the Statement of Understanding reached with the UNHCR in 1988, was precisely equivalent to a commercial contract, though I'm not sure precisely what the legal effect of an agreement with an international agency like the United Nations may be. I repeat that I wasn't party to the negotiations or the agreement on that Statement of Understanding but nevertheless, its terms are very clear and one of those terms is that the money owed should be repaid. We'll continue to remind the UNHCR of that fact. We'll continue to remind the international community of its obligations to Hong Kong. I was pleased, I repeat, that the UNHCR made clear that it understood what those obligations are and how much that debt is as recently as September and we'll continue to pursue the UNHCR on that point.