TNAG-0487-FCO40-552-Review-of-death-sentence-in-Hong-Kong-1974 — Page 169

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SECRET AND PERSONAL

72

Mr Sight

OR.

10/

Foreign and Commonwealth Office

London S.W.1

10 April 1974

Ditwiddly

His Excellency

Sir Murray MacLehose KCMG MBE Governor and Commander-in-Chief Hong Kong

AD

16/4

PA

છે

1814

"Dear Mary-

DEATH PENALTY IN HONG KONG

1.

75

I was most grateful for your telegram No 365, which provided a very clear explanation to put to Ministers of the understanding you had achieved with your Executive Council.

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2.

I enclose a

I am sorry not to have acknowledged it earlier, but I have been waiting for the submission to come back from Ministers; and, with the Secretary of State's other recent preoccupations, it only did so last weekend. copy of the submission, for your strictly personal information, so that you may see exactly how it was presented.

3.

Both Lord Goronwy Roberts and the Secretary of State were understandably relieved at this development in a potentially difficult situation, and grateful to you for your statesmanlike achievement with Executive Council. The Secretary of State has asked me to congratulate you personally on your handling of the matter. You have already had my own congratulations. I know enough now about Hong Kong to realise how tricky this must have been to put over. The result proves how high your credit stands and how wise your advisers are to trust you. There is no doubt in my own mind that, without this decision, we could have got into a confrontation over the case of Liu Chu which might very well have ended with another Tsoi decision.

4.

Anthony

We are now left with the problem of what to say in answer to Parliamentary and other questions. The topic was not in the event raised on Mr Sillar's Question (on which our exchange rests with your telegram No 366). But I think we may well get specific questions in the future. Royle has already asked me privately how things stand and, although I was able to put him off in a general reassuring way, he and others are of course well aware of the background and the possibility of difficult cases to come.

15.

SECRET AND PERSONAL