TNAG-1252-FCO40-1585-Third-countries-and-the-future-of-Hong-Kong-1983 — Page 18

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HONG KONG: THE VIEWS OF THE AUSTRALIAN COMMISSION

1. On 28 March, I was visited by David Irvine, Counsellor at the Australian Embassy, and Gary Klintworth who is responsible for politico-military reporting on China within the Australian Commission in Hong Kong. Klintworth has visited this embassy before during visits to Peking and was well-known to my predecessor. He will return to Australia in June but his successor will probably adopt a similar pattern of visits to Peking.

2. Klintworth began by asking me about the 051 debacle. Had this arisen from purely commercial reasons or was there a political dimension relating to the future of Hong Kong? I replied that we were fairly sure that the decision was not an attempt to put pressure on us over Hong Kong, and went on to rehearse the standard arguments. Klintworth said that he too had concluded that failure to ratify had been the result of commercial considerations and

said that he had detected a general tightening of Chinese attitudes towards the import of technology.

3.

Klintworth subsequently reverted to the subject of Hong Kong and asked me what I though the colony was worth to HMG. When I replied that I honestly had no idea, he said that he had tried and almost failed to come up with a figure himself. He had however turned in desperation to his NCNA contacts who had quoted a figure for the service sector of HK dollars 6,058 million per annum based on 1981 figures.

4.

Klintworth confirmed that he had good contacts with NCNA in Hong Kong - and even invited me to lunch with them whenever I was down there! He commented that recently he had noted, in talking to these contacts, a more relaxed and pragmatic attitude towards negotiations on Hong Kong's future. Whereas in October last year, they had been much preoccupied with considerations of the unequal treaties and the question of principle, they now seemed to think that it would be more productive to put aside the question of the treaties and the lease, and to concentrate on discussing practical measures to secure Hong Kong's future. Klintworth said that he had heard rumours about the possibility of China's publishing unilaterally proposals for Hong Kong's future in either June, September or October this year. He did not attach much credence to these but what did I think? said I had heard the same rumours but could not confirm their

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