TNAG-0114-FCO40-150-Detainees-and-prisoners-following-19671968-disturbances-1969 — Page 45

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(b) Long Term Prisoners

We supported the Governor in placing the cases of these

prisoners in the hands of the Board of Review; and

there is no disposition here to recommend that we press

the Governor to take these cases back out of the Board's

hands. It would clearly be most harmful to interfere

with the proceedings of the Board. We can only note

with a certain disappointment the fact that the Board is

in practice finding it difficult to recommend advancing

the date of release of many prisoners. This apart,

there remains only the possibility of an amnesty, mention

of which the Governor avoids in his telegram. We know

however that the Governor takes the view that such a move

would be disastrous at any rate at present; and on the

whole we should agree.

(c) We have come to the end of the positive steps we can take

This is no doubt true in the formal sense. There

remains however the question of our handling of day-to-

day incidents involving the communists in Hong Kong.

Here we still have the choice of/rigidly legalistic

a

or rather more pragmatic approach.

I do not think we

should wish to deprive ourselves of the flexibility

that has been used hitherto in dealing with, for

instance, communist trade union offenders or the

communist press. Indeed, it is fairly certain that

the Governor is not suggesting otherwise since the

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