CONFIDENTIAL
2
5.
It is true that we exercise discrimination against certain types of Soviet, East European, Cuban and other non- Chinese communist countries. We have, however, always been careful to allow legitimate trade and our motives are only to prevent Hong Kong being used for subversive activities aimed at the People's Republic of China,
6.
We imposed a limit on the number of Cambodian businessmen resident in Hong Kong simply because of the example of Vietnam. Relations between Vietnam and China have altered since the first Vietnamese commercial agent arrived in Kong Kong in 1958. Sino-Cambodian relations might alter similarly later.
7.
A further point is that there might be some local criticism of the United Kingdom for making Hong Kong take an unpleasant step in a "human rights" context in order to salve the conscience of the UK, which will not suffer any econo ic damage. In addition to some economic loss to liong Kong, there is also the risk of retaliation by the Cambodians. We know from the recent movement of people following the end of the var in Vietnam that a number of Cambodians have found their way to Hong Kong and there are likely to be a good many overseas Chinese still in Cambodia who have relations in Hong Kong. Finally, in this particular area I doubt if any action taken by us against the two Cambodians would remain very long from the ears of the Far Eastern Economic Review, and lead thereafter to snide comment in the Chinese press.
8.
I do not feel particularly strongly on any of the points above. If there vere criticism from the NCNA or the left-wing press to action on our part not to renew the three month visas of the Cambodians here at present, it would be open to us to take the line that the Cambodians have behaved so badly since the Khmer Rouge take-over that ve feel under no obligation to help then, The danger here is that people might say that we were getting things a little out of proportion, given the insignificance and the innocent nature of the private firm run by the two men and a secretary.
9.
We look forward to seeing the Embassy's comments from Peking, particularly since it was a Peking-inspired move to get the Cambodians here in the first place. There is an amusing
problem on the technical side. I have naturally not had time to discuss in any detail how we could close the Ren Fung Company and get rid of its staff, but Immigration Department have pointed out that the only way of getting to Cambodia is via China. Short of putting them on a plane to places like Thailand or singapore (for which they are unlikely to have valid visas and from which they would therefore be smartly returned to Hong Kong) we would have to push them over the bridge at Lowu whence they came. There has not been a successful example of our deporting anyone to China (except by prior agreement with the Chinese authorities) since the Cultural Revolution and certainly not
CONFIDENTIAL
/contd......
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