THE PRIME MINISTER
تکس
ET MON
10 DOWNING STREET
Hinn 34011
RECEIVED IN REGISTRY
12 MAY 1986
REGISTRY
DESK OFFICER
earth. Sital
INDEX
PA
Action Taken
Croa
HICD
Сс
695
7 May 1986
I was very grateful to you for writing to me on behalf of your Council on 27 February and again on 7 April to let me know the Council's views on the position of the ethnic minorities in Hong Hong.
You will now have seen our announcement and will, I hope, have received the Home Secretary's letter explaining the reasons for our decision. I recognise it will be a disappointment. But I hope the Council will accept that we gave it the most careful thought and that we considered particularly closely and sympathetically the arguments which the Council and others put in your support. But we had also to take into account all the implications of a decision like this, both in Hong Kong and elsewhere.
While we did not think it right to move in the direction you requested the arrangements we are making will fully honour the undertaking we have given that no British Dependent Territories citizens in Hong Kong, nor their children nor grandchildren should fear statelessness, and that they will have a place to call home. We are sure they are the most satisfactory and in some respects the only way to provide the necessary safeguards for a recognised citizenship and a right of abode in Hong Kong.
We are grateful to the Council for the clear and full way in which you let us have your views and we look forward
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