CONFIDENTIAL
ш кадищ
But it is pomble this Hornigworth
Mr McLaren
Qurani 25/4
HONG KONG/CHINA
1.
1. Ho
Mr Q
in waliangen 86.4
2 ja
was
59
15/
fishing
As I mentioned at Mr Cortazzi's meeting this morning,
I had a conversation yesterday evening with Miss Clare Hollingworth, Defence Correspondent of the Daily Telegraph, which appears to throw some light on the Chinese attitude to the Hong Kong Leases problem following the Governor's recent visit. She said that her Chinese Embassy contacts had criticised the reporting in the Telegraph from Mr Nigel Wade in Peking to the effect that the longer term future of Hong Kong had not been discussed while Sir Murray was there.
Miss Hollingworth's contacts (unspecified) said that there had been discussion of the Lease and that "Chinese lawyers" were working on a solution. She appears not to have been given any detail.
She asked
me if the report she had received was "on the right track". I confined myself to saying that the Governor had not gone to Peking to negotiate on the long term future of Hong Kong but that as one might have expected the matter had come up in general terms.
She did not press me to say any more than this.
2.
The idea of Chinese Lawyers coming up with specific proposals for the handling of the 1997 deadline is obviously intriguing, but Miss Hollingworth did not know enough to answer my question whether her contacts thought the Chinese were planning to make specific suggestions to the British side. But given the time of the conversation (very recently though she did not give me a date) it seems clear that the Chinese Embassy here have had some account of the Governor's discussions and that the line from Peking is at least not unfavourable to the idea of some arrangement designed to deal with the expiry of the 1899 Lease.
It seems reasonable to suppose that
any report sent to the London Embassy would find its way to Hong Kong in parallel, and I hope we may be able to pick up more while we are in Hong Kong.
4 April 1979
CC: Mr Cortazzi
Mr Murray
CONFIDENTIAL
Landsamal
R C Samuel
Far Eastern Dept
HKK oud!
RE
ль
дых х
No comments yet.
Private notes are available after approval.