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on themale
say, roll up all three parts of Hong Kong into one and give us a lease which goes on, say, for fifty years after 1997. In return we would under- take to go on managing Hong Kong on behalf of China as their tenant administrators, which they more or less regard us as being now. It is just that we need to give our sub tenants, the business- men, some kind of security of tenure into the future, we should tell them
Alternatively we might ask the Chinese to ex- tend the general lease for twenty-five years from 1997 onwards with an undertaking from them that they would always give us twenty years' notice to quit so that businessmen could wind up their affairs accordingly. But I am advised that it would on the whole be better to ask for fifty years and then wait until about twenty years before the expiry of that fifty years to renegotiate a new lease in the year, say, 2027.
The atmosphere in Peking is at this very moment particularly propitious for such an approach from us. The best way to do it would seem to be for our Ambassador in Peking to start gently but persistently pushing the idea of such an arrangement. The Chinese would soon make clear to him whether the idea is likely to meet with favour or to be thrown out of the window. The Chinese must have pointed out to them the advantages there are to them in such an arrangement and the dangers there are to them and t their industrial development if some formula cannot be devised to satisfy foreign businessmen in Hong Kong. A skilful patient but determined negotiator will, I am told by those with strong Peking contacts,
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