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PRIME MINISTER'S VISIT TO PEKING: AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL
1. As requested, I attach a reply to Amnesty
International's letter of 12 December to the Prime
Minister. We recommend that this should go from the
Prime Minister. She has written to Ms Johnstone before
and Amnesty International might interpret a reply at a
lower level as indicating less concern by HMG about huma
rights in China than in other communist countries, notab
the USSR.
2.
It would not have been appropriate for the Prime
Minister to raise as contentious a subject as human righ
in China in the context of this visit. She did not and
it would be misleading to suggest otherwise.
Because of
the continued need to cooperate with China over the
future of Hong Kong, it will never be easy to make
representations to China on what she regards as an
internal matter. Nevertheless, there is no reason in
principle why HMG should not raise human rights issues
with China. The circumstances in which this is done
would need careful judgement, as would anything
said publicly on the subject.
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