TNAG-1245-FCO40-1559-Press-reports-on-the-future-of-Hong-Kong-1983 — Page 5

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WORLD AT ONE: SIR ROBIN DAY: 30 JUNE, 1983

ARTICLE IN THE FAR EASTERN ECONOMIC REVIEW

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The influential periodical, the Far Eastern Economic Review, is reporting that Mrs Thatcher has written a personal letter to the Chinese Premier to clear the way for further talks on the future of Hong Kong. Talks between the two sides were broken off more than four months ago after Chinese anger at Mrs Thatcher's insistence that part of the Colony was legally granted to Britain in perpetuity. The Chinese argue however that the territory was ceded to Britain under duress. The Far Eastern Economic Review is also reporting that the two sides, China and Britain, will soon issue statements that

a solution to the Colony's/Puertalan be found. We telephoned Derek Davis, editor of the periodical, in Hong Kong this morning and asked him if Mrs Thatcher's letter effectively admits that Britain is now willing to negotiate the sovereignty of the whole Colony.

Davis:

We are not saying that. We believe that by obliquely stating that sovereignty should not be allowed to come between the two parties Mrs Thatcher has, in fact, realised that by insisting on the legalities of the treaties which set up Hong Kong in the aftermath of the 19th century opium wars, that that is in fact a rather weak negotiating point since everyone realises that the lease on the New Territories, which expires in 1997, will expire and that would leave Britain really no practical ability to remain here in any role at all after 1997, since the

Kowloon peninsula and Hong Kong island itself, which are ceded in perpetuity according to the two first treaties, cannot exist independently of

the new territories.

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Interviewer:

So Mrs Thatcher is quite willing to admit that the area of Hong Kong that is owned by Britain in perpetuity can't remain ours in perpetuity, that it will have to go along with the rest of the new territories when the Chinese repossess the whole

area?

Davis: I wouldn't read those views into her letter. We have not had a sight of that letter and as you know the negotiations are being conducted in the utmost confidentiality. But the terms of her letter

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