TNAG-1372-FCO40-1818-Ministerial-visits-from-the-UK-to-Hong-Kong-1985 — Page 86

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structure of

of NCNA with Regional Offices being set up in Hong Kong,

Kowloon and the new territories. This appears in part to be

designed to match the geographical basis on which representative government is evolving in Hong Kong. There have also been major personality changes in recent years. Following the arrival in 1983 of Xu Jiatun as Director. Many long-service Cantonese cadres have been replaced by newly-imported officials

from the mainland. The

number of mainland cadres known to be working in Hong Kong

increased from 1,076 in 1982 to 2,832 in June 1985.

3.

has

NCNA's current covert and overt activities may be summarised

as follows:

(a)

(b)

Discouraging the formation of political parties and warnings about dangers of too rapid a movement towards representative

government, arising from suspicion

suspicion that

be that the British may

seeking to pre-empt

in order to pre-empt the terms of the Basic Law, and to reduce the pressure of public demand for a system which the Chinese might find difficult to control after 1997.

to

Seeking to identify and win over promising younger Hong Kong

Chinese, both inside and outside the Civil Service who are competent and well-regarded locally and whom they expect be in positions of power and influence by 1997. Such people are extensively cultivated by the more sophisticated impressive Chinese officials now working in NCNA, and are

also invited to pay visit to China.

and

(c)

Cultivating the

media and public in Hong Kong neutralise or isolate opposition and gain

China's policies.

order

to

acceptance

for

(d)

Building contacts and winning over community organisations at the grassroots level with the apparent aim of strengthening their influence in the bases upon which representative

Government is evolving.

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