TNAG-1625-FCO40-2239-Relations-between-Hong-Kong-and-China-1987 — Page 79

PS/Lord Glenarthur

CONFIDENTIAL

020/

fr Sau 248.

784/12

Cris

(-2

From:

RJT McLaren

Date:

HK B

15 DEC 1967

ト

Mr

CC:

3 December 1987

Gillmore

Mr Cooper FED

Mr Gore-Booth, Planners

(with despatch 0

Mr Hum, HKD

Mr Hemans, Soviet Dept

Mr Walker,

Research Dept

CHINA'S FOREIGN POLICY

*

-

1 I commend Sir R Evans' despatch of 26 October on China's foreign policy (attached, together with covering minutes from Far Eastern Department I am sorry to have held it up). I know that the Ambassador took a good deal of trouble over

ensure that he receives a substantive the despatch and I will response in due course.

2.

The Ambassador provides a good survey, with proper emphasis on the historical determinants of Chinese policy (in particular, the humiliations of the nineteenth century and the experience of Japanese aggression in the 1930s and 40s, and Soviet bullying and betrayal in the 1950s) and on China's long-term national interests. He also notes a steady shift of emphasis and style over the past few years, away from the turgid Maospeak of Chinese foreign policy statements of the first twentyfive years of the People's Republic and towards a more cooperative outward looking approach. As one would expect, there has been less change in the underlying themes and priorities of Chinese policy, reflecting a basic continuity of interests. Even during the height of the Cultural Revolution, when China was wracked by disorders tantamount to civil war, Chinese actions in the foreign affairs field (as opposed to their words) were marked by caution.

3.

One of the major shifts of emphasis has been an increasing readiness to develop genuine links with western countries and to play an active and from our point of view reasonably construct- ive

role in the work of international organizations, including the UN Security Council. I am quite sure that we should build on the entree provided by our Hong Kong relationship (an element of solid substance which no other western country, with the possible exception of the US, can match) to engage the Chinese in a thorough dialogue on a broad range of foreign policy issues. This is what Sir R Evans appears to be suggesting in the penultimate paragraph of his despatch, though I find that passage a little obscure.

RJT McLaren

CONFIDENTIAL