Sir Denis Greenhill
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Hong Kong: Long-Term Study
An interim report (OPD(67)61) was prepared in
July 1967 on the prospects for withdrawal from Hong Kong if it
were suddenly forced upon us. Ministers further instructed
officials to examine policy towards our tenure of Hong Kong
in the long-term, on the basis that we could not rely on
remaining in Hong Kong on present terms until the lease of
the New Territories lapsed in 1997 and should therefore
consider what adaptations of its status might be possible
and desirable after the conclusion of the present conflict
in Viet-Nam. Responsibility for implementing these
instructions was assumed by the Cabinet Office and carried
out by a small group of the Defence Review Working Party.
The Report, although substantially the work of departments
of the former Commonwealth Office and Foreign Office is,
therefore, an interdepartmentally agreed study. It was
prepared in consultation (as opportunity offered) with the
Governor of Hong Kong and Sir Donald Hopson, former Chargé
d'Affaires in Peking. For security reasons no copy of the
Report (or of earlier drafts) is held by anyone outside
Whitehall.
2.
We have been invited by the Cabinet Office to present
the Report, as now agreed at Official level, to the Ministerial
Committee on Hong Kong.
The Foreign and Commonwealth
Secretary is Chairman of the Committee and the members are
/the..
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