TNAG-0078-FCO40-114-Action-against-Communist-press-1967 — Page 37

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CONFIDENTIAL

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ГОР СОР

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COMMONWEALTH OFFICE (D.T.D.)

HW

26 December 1967

IMMEDIATE

HONG KONG

ΤΟ

Telno 1910

CONFIDENTIAL

Addressed to Commonwealth Office telegram No. 1910 of

26 December,

Repeated for information to Peking.

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Your telegram No. 2619: Prison Visits F

I am afraid that it is essential from our point of view to avoid appearing to discriminate between those Left-Wing prisoners who have been sentenced for offences against the laws of the colony and other prisoners in the same prisons. The point is that the two categories of prisoners are living side by side; and if we were to allow the Left-Wingers obvious concessions, e.g. the right to wear special clothing we should simply be asking for trouble.

2. Again, it is most important to us to avoid lending colour to imputations that existing arrangements for the welfare of prisoners are inadequate. They are in fact liberal by any standards.

3. It might, however, be possible within the existing rules to go some way towards meeting the NCNA points:-

(i) Clothing. The ordinary prison clothes are supplied in accordance with a scale laid down by the Director of Medical Services and we could not allow the NCNA men to wear anything extra. But friends of prisoners are allowed to send in clothing for individuals to wear when they are released, on condition the clothes are placed in store; and the NCNA could, if necessary, be told they might take advantage of this rule.

(ii) Foodstuffs. Christian organizations are from time to time permitted to send in reasonable amounts of food at Christmas for the welfare of prisoners. It might be possible to arrange for Chinese organisations to be permitted to do likewise at Chinese New Year, and again to let the Communists know in advance that they could take advantage of this. The details would need carefully working out, however.

4. The difficulty in point 1(b, of your telegram under reference could be met quite easily if we let the NCNA know that they might write to the two prisoners to suggest their asking for a special visit. It would however be necessary to emphasise that:-

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(a) that such visits are personal ones to individual prisoners, and not anything like visits of inspection to the prison as a whole;

(b) whether or not to approve such visits is a matter solely for the discretion of the prison authorities.

If we were now to give a reply to the NCNA here on the lines of paragraphs 3-4 above we should of course have no guarantee of

CONFIDENTIAL

/quid pro quo