TNAG-0643-FCO40-791-Involvement-of-Hong-Kong-in-air-services-agreements-1977 — Page 60

1

CONFIDENTIAL

112

布政司署

香港下亞畢道

*** OUR REF.: CR 7/951/57

* YOUR REF.:

JAB Stewart Esq OBE

GOVERNment seCRETARIAT

8119/12

in excitall

ん

2

Ruta 15

PARO

Hong Kong & General Department

F CO

lees

HONG KONG/VIETNAM AIR LINK

LOWER ALBERT ROAD

HONG KONG

13 December, 1977

trike te spap

дав

cay should gat to DOT (trayh MAED) jeils

17/12

Robert Tesh has sent us a copy of his letter of 2 December to Stables in the Department of Trade (also copied to you and SEAD) in which he records a low level Vietnamese suggestion about developing cargo flights between Saigon and Hong Kong.

2.

You and he will know from our recent telegrams to Vientiane (No. 25 of 2 December and No. 27 of 9 December, repeated to FCO and Hanoi) that we are taking a tough line at present on the question of charter flights to and from Indo-China. There are two reasons for this. One is that we do not at present have adequate communications links and air traffic control arrangements with any of the Indo-China countries. This means that flights coming from any point in Indo-China to Kai Tak can pose unacceptable air safety problems. Second, we are anxious not to lose any leverage on Vietnam (or Laos) over the question of over-flying rights which are of considerable importance to British airlines, including Cathay Pacific. If we allow the Vietnamese to fly non-scheduled services to Hong Kong, or allow other airlines such as the Japanese to use Hong Kong as a jumping off point for non-scheduled services to Hanoi or Saigon, we can hardly continue to refuse over-flight to those scheduled carriers who have pressed for this in the past and whose requests have been rejected on the grounds of inadequate air traffic control and communications arrangements, these arrangements being common to both forms of operation. A further consideration is that if we provide the Vietnamese with most of what they want in the way of direct air services, we reduce the pressure on them to concede over-flying rights.

3.

It follows from the above that we would not wish to agree to cargo flights between Saigon and Hong Kong until the questions both of over-flying rights and air traffic control and communications procedures have been sorted out.

/contd...

CONFIDENTIAL

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