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THE COURSE OF THE NEGOTIATIONS
9.
The Prime Minister's visit was followed by the first phase of negotiations conducted by H M Ambassador, Peking and the Chinese Foreign Ministry. These consisted of exchanges between the two sides on the basis on which the negotiations would be conducted, and on the agenda. On 1 July 1983 it was announced that the second phase of the talks would begin in Peking on 12 July. The pattern of negotiation in the second phase, which was continued until the end of the negotiations, was for formal rounds of talks to be held between delegations led by HM Ambassador in Peking and a Vice-Minister of the Chinese Foreign Ministry, supplemented as necessary by informal contacts between the two delegations. Governor of Hong Kong took part in every round of formal talks as a member of the British delegation.
The
10. In the course of the negotiations the British side put forward a number of background and working papers. The background papers explained the systems which prevail in Hong Kong and the importance for these systems of the British administrative role and link. Following discussion of these papers, it became clear that in the Chinese view sovereignty and the right of administration over Hong Kong were inseparable, and that no continuation of British administration after 1997 would be aceptable to China. The British side therefore proposed that the two sides discuss what effective measures other than continued British administration might be devised to maintain the stability and prosperity of Hong Kong and explore further the Chinese ideas which had at that stage been explained to them, in order to see whether China and Britain could construct on this basis arrangements which would ensure lasting stability and prosperity for Hong Kong. The Chinese side were told that if this process was successful, the British Government would recommend to Parliament a bilateral agreement enshrining the
arrangements. The British Government also undertook to assit in the implementation of such arrangements, and to recommend to Parliament that sovereignty and administrative control pass to China. Following this, the British side presented to the Chinese a series of working papers which took as the basis for discussion China's proposals for Hong Kong as a Special
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