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Historical Status of Macau
1.
The Portuguese received the permission of the Chinese authorities in Canton to establish a settlement in Macau in 1557. For many years they paid a form of rent to local Chinese authorities, and a Chinese mandarin was stationed in the territory with varying degrees of actual and claimed control over the local inhabitants. In 1849 the Governor refused to continue paying the
rent and turned out the Chinese customs.
Formal Cession to Portugal
2.
The status of Macau was not clarified legally until December
1887 when, by treaty, the Chinese confirmed the "perpetual
occupation and government of Macau and its dependencies by Portugal as any other Portuguese possession". Portuguese sovereignty was to some extent limited by another clause which stipulated that the territory of Macau should not be alienated by Portugal withut the
agreement of China. This clause was included to meet British fears
about the possibility that Portugal might face pressure to cede
Macau to a stronger power, which would present a challenge to Britain's interests in Hong Kong. A preliminary protocol was signed
in Lisbon in March 1887, with Mr James Duncan Campbell, an official
of the Chinese customs, signing on behalf of China.
3. The Government of the People's Republic of China (PRC) regards the 19th Century treaties concluded with Western powers, amongst
them the 1887 agreements with Portugal, as "unequal". In 1972 the
Chinese Government conveyed a letter to the UN Committee on Decolonization expressing its view that Macau (like Hong Kong) was part of Chinese territory under foreign occupation, adding that the settlement of the questions of Hong Kong and Macau was "entirely
within China's sovereign right" and "does not at all fall under the
ordinary category of 'colonial territories'". The letter said that the question "should be settled in an appropriate way when
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