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PERSONAL AND CONFIDENTIAL
Foreign and Commonwealth Office
His Excellency
Sir Murray MacLehose KCMG MBE
Governor
HONG KONG
"Wear Thurs
London S.W.1
24 July 1973
149)
180
DEATH PENALTY IN HONG KONG
You will see from my separate confidential letter in the same bag that Ministers have decided to take no steps to alter the existing law in Hong Kong (or in the other dependent territories either). They explicitly accepted the possibility of further executions in Hong Kong, and their request for information on the growth of capital crimes was made in the context of the need to override criticism in Parliament in that event.
Nevertheless Ministers have not (and indeed could not) finally rule out the possibility of further reprieves by The Queen in circumstances other than a miscarriage of justice. They said that although, for the sake of good order in the Colony, it was important to uphold you in your decisions, the attitude of Parliament would make it necessary to scrutinise most carefully any cases which might in future be the subject of petitions to The Queen.
All this happened before we received your telegrams numbers 788 and 789. You will, I am sure, welcome the general decision, and even the reservation on the ultimate possibility of reprieves by The Queen may not surprise you. It was inherently unlikely that we should return unreservedly to the pre-Tsoi position. Everything depends on how the reservation works out in practice. If conflict is to be avoided, then before you take any decision to let the law take its course, you will need to be absolutely certain of Ministers' views on current circumstances in the UK and on the case in question, and that these views will remain unchanged. This implies a need for even closer liaison between us, which I am sure we can achieve.
/I fear
PERSONAL AND CONFIDENTIAL
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