spedic offers by our Mission in Peking to
exchange Mr. Grey for Hsueh P'ing, one of the two
NONA reporters imprisoned in Hong Kong.
The Chinese have not responded to Mr. Brown's
letter or to these specific offers,
4. Mr. Grey was detained in retaliation for
the arrest of Hsueh P'ing. Another NONA
journalist in Hong Kong, Lo Yakwo, was
subsequently arrested.
They are due for
release on 17 November 1968 and 12 September
sure granted
1969 respectively, if they garn full remission.
Of other Communist newspaper workers convicted
in Hong Kong during the troubles, eleven are
still in prison. The last prisoner in this
group, Wong Chak, will be due for release
with full remission on 2 February 1971.
Before we were able to obtain a visit to
Mr. Grey last April, we had on Chinese
insistence to allow special visits to all
"patriotic newspaper workers" imprisoned in
Hong Kong.
ARGUMENT
5. It is highly unlikely that the Chinese
price for Mr. Grey would be less than Hsueh
and Lo. If we were able to get into negotiations with them (but see paragraph 12
below), they might in the first instance at
least try to insist on the release of the
eleven other newspaper employees as well, but
settle eventually for less. If there in to
be no extraordinary remission of sentences in
Hong Kong, it is possible therefore that at
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