CONFIDENTIAL
布政司署
香港下亞
畢道
* OUR REF.:
SCR 1/4731/49
* Your Ref.:
HKTS
320/1
83
GOVERNMENT SECRETARIAT
LOWER ALBERT ROAD
HONG KONG
RECEIVED IN REGISTRY 170. 51 31 July, 1978.
9 AUG 1978
DESK OFFICER
INDEX
PA
REGLERY Action Taun
J/T
R JT McLaren Esq
Hong Kong & General Department F CO
༣༧་ཚེས་ ༡
THE NEW DIRECTOR OF THE NCNA
81
سحماه
Leer
PACE "
I wrote to you on 7 July saying that we were expecting a new Director of the local NCNA, Wang K'uang. He arrived on 20 July, accompanied by the two new Deputy Directors I had mentioned, Li Chi-hsin and Lo K'o-ming.
2.
Iain Orr and I had our first chance to meet Wang on 28 July at a lunch arranged by the previous Director, Li Chu-sheng. Incidentally, I was correct in my previous assumption that Li would be named No. 2 Director. That is now his official title.
3.
I find it hard to give an accurate picture of Wang. The lunch was a remarkably lively and outspoken occasion; but nearly all the talking was done by Li. I had expected nothing but social chat, with many friendly remarks about Wang's new arrival, mutual co-operation etc. In fact Li embarked on a series of hard-hitting comments about local issues, the most important of which I am reporting in a separate letter. I can only imagine that he was trying to prove his mettle in front of the new Director. Whatever the reason, the way in which things developed inevitably made Wang appear as a somewhat colourless figure. Perhaps he is. The description of him which immediately sprang to our minds was "convalescent". This impression was created partly by his reluctance to commit himself at all to any details about his previous career (e.g. when he had been in Yenan or when he had previously visited Hong Kong, which I knew he had as a young man or a boy) and could be a consequence of the political traumas he must have suffered over the past years. There also seemed to be an element of physical convalescence. He looked frail and (even allowing for his slight build and fairly advanced years) shrunken. The other members of
the NCNA were careful to look after him by taking cups of tea out of his hand and placing them on the table. Their
/contd.
CONFIDENTIAL
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