CO537-2187 — Page 100

No. 3/0 544 (8698/1077/47)

CONFIDENTIAL

BRITISH EMBASSY,

NANKING,

3rd July, 1947.

My letter No. S/O 513 of 24th June 1947 about

Macao and Hong Kong.

My Portuguese colleague came to see me today to tell me about an interview which he had yesterday with the Minister for Foreign Affairs.

૩

This arose out of an account which appeared in the China Daily Tribune of June 28th (copy of extract enclosed) of

statement made at a closed meeting of the Resident Committee of the Peoples Political Council by the Minister for Foreign Affairs regarding Macao. According to the Portuguese Minister this gives a completely distorted view of a conversation which he had had with Dr. Wang Shih-chieh about the speech of the Portuguese Minister for the Colonies mentioned in my letter under reference. Senhor Fonseca assured me that Dr. Wang made no

mention whatever of the return of Macao and added that in practically every other respect the newspaper account was untrue. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued a dementi on the following day to the effect that the report was inaccurate.

Senhor Fonseca was not, however, satisfied with this and he demanded an interview with Dr. Wang which was accorded to him yesterday. He says that he approached the matter in the friendliest possible manner taking the line that although the dementi had appeared, the China Daily Tribune's account seemed so circumstantial that he would like to assure the Portuguese Government that Dr. Wang and he were in fact in agreement on the substance of their conversation. Dr. Wang had, however, taken his approach badly, had drawn his attention to the dementi, had implied that what he, as Minister for Foreign Affairs, said in a closed meeting of the Peoples Political Council was his business and in general had given him the impression of trying to pick a quarrel.

It

(This sounds so unlike my experience of Dr. Wang that I think my Portuguese colleagues approach must in fact have been less friendly than he tried to make out. He is not very happy here, owing largely to his failure so far to secure reasonable accommodation, and is liable to be hypercritical. is more than likely that he started off with a protest about the press distortion and somehow put Dr. Wang's back up. Particularly as, in point of fact, the latter very probably said to the Peoples Political Council precisely what he is reported to have said and thus had an uneasy conscience.

G.V.

Kitson, Esquire, C.B.E.,

China Department,

Foreign Office,

London, S.W.1.

After/

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