TNAG-1491-FCO40-2049-Future-of-Hong-Kong-General-Agreement-on-Tariffs-and-Trade-(-1986 — Page 57

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AWO Ltd. 7/84

Reference. FILE

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SKIAHJ

CONFIDENTIAL

Mr Currie

FED

EUROPEAN POLITICAL COOPERATION:

UK

JK PRESIDENCY; ASIA WORKING GROUP

1.

Mr Orr's minute of 14

contact for the AWG.

February refers.

I shall be the HKD

2.

I mentioned at Dr Wilson's meeting on 14 February which HKD may wish to propose for discussion in Po Co:

a) Hong Kong/GATT

two subjects

future

1997?

-

We have proposed to the Chinese that they and we should jointly declare that Hong Kong, and after 1997 the Hong Kong Special

Administrative Region, should be deemed to be a separate contracting party to the GATT, under Article XXVI (5) (c) of

the treaty.

If, as we hope, the Chinese agree to this at the

next meeting of the Joint Liaison Group in mid-March, we shall

want to approach ou r main trading partners to prepare the

ground.

There may be concern at the implications for the

might China in effect have two voices in GATT after

and s ome partners might be tempted to see this

procedure as opportunity to negotiate advantages in terms of trade with Hong Kong. We hope that political considerations

the need to mak e the Sino-British Joint Declaration on Hong

Kong work and, therefore, to secure Hong Kong's international trading status in plenty of time will prevail. But, depending

оп the initial reactions of our trading partners to Our

approaches on this (which we shall probably make in capitals

and at Geneva) we may wish

to engage their political

by raising the matter in Po Co.

attention

R.

HKK040/2

STRE

- 6 MAR 1986

STAY in takdő

1389/2

CONFIDENTIAL