TNAG-1245-FCO40-1559-Press-reports-on-the-future-of-Hong-Kong-1983 — Page 22

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The Financial Daily said Mr. Xi's attitude was "serious and forceful," and was representative in putting across the views of policy makers in China.

The paper felt the point regarding honour would be a new administrative system here acceptable to both China and Britain, and which would ensure the economic interest of Britain.

3.

STATEMENT BY LORD MACLEHOSE:

An AFP despatch from London quoted Lord MacLehose as saying that talks on HK's future would still face a great problem even if an acceptable package was agreed. The problem was how to convince the world of international finance and investment that the package would last. He though that if the anxiety of HK people and investors was to be removed, some way must be found to assure them that acceptable new arrangements, once made, would not be interfered with.

This prompted HKU lecturer, Dr. John Young, to make a speculative remark on TVB news on 21 May. He said the reported statement by Lord MacLehose would imply that a package had been proposed. The remark was revealing in the sense that we could almost verify or confirm that there had been a package.

The Government issued a denial that evening saying: "The Governor explained the state of play of negotiations during his broadcast last night. As he said, the talks are proceeding and are moving in the right direction. That is the correct statement of position. There is no package."

The Government statement was reported by TVB on its late evening news bulletins, which continued to run Dr. Young's interview, prefixed by the denial and by describing the reported "package" as "hypothetical."

The Government's clarification was prominently reported by a number of Chinese- language papers on Sunday. Some quoted the Director of Information Services, Mr. Peter Tsao, as saying that the Government was trying to obtain the full text of Lord MacLehose's speech through the London office. It would not be appropriate for the Government to comment on the speech before a full text was available.

The Government's statement was also reported by AFP in a despatch filed from HK on Saturday. The report led off by saying that the Governor, Sir Edward Youde, had issued a statement saying there was "no package" in the current negotiations between China and Britain on the future of HK. It issued a correction two hours later to the effect that the denial was made by a Government spokesman rather than the Governor himself.

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