But it's Britain which has the principle and the greatest moral responsibility to Hong Kong. A responsibility which is the result of the treaty that we signed in 1984. That treaty was lodged at the United Nations and were it to be broken I'm sure that either party would wish to take up the matter internationally as vigorously as possible. It's neither fair to China nor politically sensible for me or a British Minister to calibrate precisely what sort of action we would take if the Joint Declaration was breached. It would depend on what sort of breach, whether it was a large breach or a small breach, whether there was a pattern of breaches by China. I very much hope that that won't happen but I know perfectly well that Britain is going to be held accountable for anything that might go wrong by many in the international community and that Britain will therefore be expected to make its own position clear should there be any breach. I repeat, I very much hope that there won't be but on June 30, 1997, Britain's interest in Hong Kong doesn't end as a commercial interest and as a moral interest as well.
End
Reports on the case of two VM girls made public
The Government today (Thursday) made public the reports of the enquiries into the circumstances of the two Vietnamese migrant (VM) girls who were separated from their parents following the riots in the Whitehead Detention Centre on May 10 to 11. The enquiries were carried out by the Correctional Services Department (CSD) on the instruction of the Governor.
Two separate reports were compiled. Both emphasise the difficulties faced by the staff in the Whitehead and High Island Detention centres on May 10 and 11 as well as in the immediate succeeding days.
In the case of the three-year-old girl, who was transferred to the High Island Detention Centre, the report concludes that her relatives were largely accountable for her prolonged separation from her parents.
Nonetheless, the report is critical of the unsympathetic handling of the case by CSD staff and recommends that procedures should be reviewed.