XN000022-1996-07-09 — Page 2

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Transcript of Deputy to the Governor's media session

Following is the transcript of the media session by the Deputy to the Governor, Mr Donald Tsang, at Central Government Offices this (Tuesday) afternoon:

Question: Was he asked to resign, to initiate the letter?

Deputy to Governor: I have said it many times already. Mr Leung himself wrote to the Secretary for the Civil Service last week and asking permission to retire for personal reasons, and the Secretary for Civil Service, having considered all the circumstances involved and exceptionally, approved the application.

Question: So would you admit that the Ming Pao report this morning was inaccurate?

Deputy to Governor: I am not going to comment on that. There are so many reports on this subject, I think, many of them are speculative in nature.

End

Ship captain summonsed for oil spill

The Marine Department has issued summonses and a notice of intended prosecution to the captain of M V National Pride and the owner of the Hong Kong United Dockyards respectively in connection with the oil spill incident which was reported last Saturday (July 6), a department spokesman said today (Tuesday).

Charges on the summonses are:

(a)

provide arrival information in respect of the vessel condition which he knew to be false and misleading (Section 75 of the Shipping and Port Control Ordinance);

(b)

failure to report oil spill incident (Section 48(a) of the Shipping and Port Control Ordinance); and

(c)

discharge of oil into the waters of Hong Kong (Section 46(b)(i) of the Shipping and Port Control Ordinance)