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RECEIVED SINETRO. 51
INDEX
with-159.
OFFICER
REGIS BY
PA
Action Teken
MXE 131/39311
No. 40
Nesla
Imola
NOTE VERBALE ERBAUE
A
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The Minister for Hong Kong Commercial Relations with the European Communities and the Member States presents his compliments to the Directorate-General for External Relations of the Commission of the European Communities and has the honour to refer to the consultations which were held on 25 July 1978 regarding questions of classification.
2.
CA
The Hong Kong Government regrets that despite the fact that these consultations were requested by Hong Kong with a view to reachiny definitive agreement the Commission was not in a position to enter into substantive discussions on any of the problems until a meeting of the Nomenclature Committee sometime in September.
3.
The Hong Kong Government expresses its concern over the lack of progress in resolving these classification questions, some of which had been identified by Hong Kong as far back as
Others were notified to the the Negotiations in November 1977. Commission in January 1978. Consultations on these problems
In each case were held in March, in June, and finally in July.
The Comm- a delegation from Hong Kong travelled to Brussels. ission's agreement to these consultations is taken by the Hong Kong Government as an indication of the Commission's awareness of such problems. As for the consultations in July, a Hong Kong delegation came to Brussels for no other purpose than to engage in what it understood to be definitive consultations on
The Hong Kong Government the outstanding classification issues. is unable to understand how its invitation to the Commission to engage in consultations (which were clearly intended by Hong Kong to be definitive) could have been accepted when the Com ission presumably knew in advance that it was not in a position to reach a definitive agreement on any of the questions at issue. The Hong Kong Government cannot afford the deployment of its limited resources in senior staff and in other respects for such abortive discussions. The Hong Kong Government is therefore disappointed that no practicable solution has so far been reached with the Commission and, indeed, that no definitive response has been made by the Commission to any proposals by Hong Kong.
4.
The Hong Kong Government stands ready to resume these consultations immediately if such consultations would result in
If, as definitive solutions to the classification problems. the Commission has indicated during the last round of consult- ations, such consultations cannot be held before September at the earliest, the Hong Kong Government has come reluctantly to
./the view...
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The Directorate-General for External Relations Commission of the European Communities Brussels
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