TNAG-0983-FCO40-1202-Immigration-from-China-to-Hong-Kong-1980 — Page 8

LU:

SECRET

We will confirm the time of handing over through the Lowu China Travel Service and immigration and we will do our best to confirm the times which you request.

DONALD: With regard to the start of this agreement, we would start on 30 November and all those caught on the 30th and afterwards would be sent back. So therefore the first return might not take place until late Sunday or Monday. But you should be ready to receive a list from the 30th onwards.

FU: The 30th.

We think you should start sending them back on

DONALD: We would instruct our police and immigration authorities to start the new arrangements as from the 30th. It might be helpful if I said what we are going to do with regard to the press when we start to return people to China. We will tell them we have returned some people and will say that they have been refused entry and have been sent back. We will give details if asked and we will be prepared to say that agreement has been reached with Chinese authorities locally and that there have also been discussions through diplomatic channels in London and Feking, that we welcome this approach because it is a sensible way to regulate affairs on the border and that we will send back those who enter unlawfully. But we will have to prepare our people and give them some time to start, so therefore the 2nd or the 3rd December might be the first day that we actually send anyone back and that it became public.

LU:

Last time you mentioned that you had to deal with the press.

They need not know how or where we reached agreement. All that needs to be said is that we are doing it by mutual agreement. Now I suggest that we have a short rest and then summarise the agreement.

DONALD: There is just something I would like to add. On 27 August, I expressed our deep appreciation of the steps taken by your side to reduce those who were coming lawfully into Hong Kong. You remember I said that a continuation of this policy would make it easier to adopt the measures we have been discussing. We may have trouble making the people in Hong Kong understand why we are taking this stern action and if we can explain that it is part of our general concern about numbers entering Hong Kong, then so much the better. What I am about to say is not part of our specific agreement, but I would like to suggest to you that it would be helpful if we could point to a reduction in numbers coming from China legally, a reduction in the total numbers entering Hong Kong. I put this to you because it would be helpful in explaining the agreement to people in Hong Kong.

/contd...

SECRET