TNAG-1248-FCO40-1562-Press-reports-on-the-future-of-Hong-Kong-1983 — Page 115

CONFIDENTIAL

Foreign and Commonwealth Office London SW1A 2AH

Telephone 01-

M. Morris

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RJT McLaren Esq Hong Kong

Dear Robin,

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CONTEMPORARY CHINA INSTITUTE

29 June 1983

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1. Many thanks for your letter of 16 June. the meetings of the Committee of Management both in 1982 and in 1983, and should perhaps have made earlier mention of the conference proposed for 1984.

2. In fact, as you surmised, the conference has fallen by the way- side or at least has been shelved. The discussion in 1982 was very general, and of course preceded the Prime Minister's visit to Hong Kong and Peking. I did no more than mention the obvious sensitivity of the issue. In the event there was no mention of the conference at all at this year's meeting, but I had a quiet word with Hugh Baker on this subject. Apparently the conference had originally been the idea of a group of Hong Kong businessmen who were prepared to put up the necessary money, but when Hugh Baker visited Hong Kong in February of this year and contacted them again, their interest had sharply declined. Clearly the, question of the future has been well aired in public discussion in recent months and the demand for a conference was correspondingly less.

3. I enclose, in case it is not reaching you by other means, a copy of the draft annual report for 1983 of the Contemporary China Institute You will see that it refers in paragraph 3(a) to the forthcoming issue of the China Quarterly, due to appear in August, which will be devoted largely to a discussion of Hong Kong. Dick Clift has been in touch with you about this (his teleletter of 23 March), and when I spoke to Hugh Baker about it recently, he confirmed that the only article of likely interest to us would be that by Anthony Dicks on the sovereignty question. I imagine that nothing he said would be any more embarrassing to HMG than speculation by numerous other academics, but you may be in a better position to seek him out.

Cc: HKD

Chancery, Peking CONFIDENTIAL

Yours ever,

Márk

MKK040/2

RECEIVED IN REGISTRY NO. 41 19 JUL 1983

DESK OF HEAL

Mark Elliot DEX Far Eastern Dept

pril 18 кн

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