TNAG-1407-FCO40-1882-Future-of-Hong-Kong-passports-and-visas-1985 — Page 36

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Replies to

BRISH EMBASSY

35 rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré

75383 Paris Cedex 08

DMM/BD

RA

CONSULAR SECTION

BRITISH EMBASSY

2 Cité du Retiro

75008 Paris

Tél. :4266.91.42

RJ Miller Esq

MVD

ECO

Ref K 349/2

Yr Ref GVV FRAN/349/1

30 October 1985

GWY FRAN | 3491

1 1 NOV 1965

www.

HK.11.040/28

ZC-NOV 1985

DESK OFFREY.

INDEX

REGISTRY

Action Taken

Dear Robest

1134

in Hilk c40/25'3'

!

In your letter GVV FRAN/349/1 of 5 September you asked me to try to obtain some clarification of whether BDTCs, of Hong Kong in particular, do or do not need visas for short visits to France. I accordingly wrote to M. Roux, an appropriate official in the Ministry of External Relations.

2

"

M Roux subsequently telephoned me by way of interim and informal reply. He said that, as it happened, he had been considering the question before my letter arrived. His view was that visas were not essential he was putting this view to the Ministry of the Interior; their view would presumably be based on their interpretation of the 1947 Visa Abolitia Agreement (VAA) and he would let me know when that view was notified to him.

3 M. Roux went on to ask whether I could tell him the official British view or my personal view. I said I could offer only a personal view, and that stemmed not from a study of the text of the VAA, but from what

i e I understood the practice had been in the great majority of cases, that visas were not required, and that genuine visitors arriving without visa were admitted without difficulty. M. Roux seized on this mention of actual practice, and said he too had focussed on the practice in taking the line that visas were not required.

4.

M. Roux added that although there were differences between the letter from the French Consulate General in Hong Kong and the hand-out notes from the French Consulate General in London, there was no contradiction. BDTCs were not included in the list of visa-free nationals on the first page, but they were also not included among the visa nationals on the second page. On the second page, however, he had noticed only the Hong Kong (C.I. holders) entry. I drew his attention to the Great Britain entry and footnote (4), and he then acknowledged that a contradiction existed.

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