TNAG-1903-FCO40-2705-Hong-Kong-cabinet-meetings-on-Vietnamese-refugees-1990 — Page 69

Ard Levin

ong Kong-style

e Inter- n Civil and the

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Drafting lain Eng- of the andoned urally) to

hts pro- "Consti-

that,

s not right to torture, reatment om from bour, to

the right not to be subject to retroactive criminal law, to free- dom 10 seek and receive information and ideas of all kinds (those words are taken from the Covenant referred to), to the right of a trial with the prior presumption of innocence and freedom from self-in- crimination, to the right of a public hearing and trial without undue delay.

No doubt the Foreign Office will flap an irritated hand at me, saying that such things are still under discussion and that such speculations only hinder the Government's vigorous insis- tence on further safeguards: well, under British law everyone is free to believe part, or even all.

of what the Foreign Office says. without even being obliged to say why.

If our government would only say that Hong Kong cannot be held free if the Chinese insist otherwise, that we cannot go to war with China as we did with Argentina, that whatever rights we enshrined i. t Basic Lav there would be no possibility of enforcing them once China had taken over, and that it is a waste of time to deplore what we cannot alter. I would have a good deal of sympathy with those views. But it is not Britain's hypocrisy that angers me most.

For there is a perfectly prag- matic way of avoiding the impending catastrophe; I put it

forward at the time the treaty was signed. At the momem,

ALL

almost d people of Hong Kong wo car get out (which really means who have some- where the can go 10) C demonstratg their faith in British rod Chinese promises br leaving: even the Foreign Office has expressed itself as disturbed by the exodus (i am not ah- solutely certain that Sir Geoffrey didn't pis. express surprise). What is needed is an inter- national exercise to enable all those Hong Kong citizens who wish to leave, but at present have no opportunity to do so. to settle somewhere else.

T

here is ΠΟ way of guessing how many they may number; 1 imagine that many of the older people would decline to leave, and many of the most enterprising character would stay, reasoning that they will prosper under Chinese rule. And of course, there must be those who feel strongly attached to their Chinese origin and will be happy to become Chinese citizens. Yet others will shrug. and make a life for themselves as best they can.

Perhaps we are talking about two or three million souls surely not more, and possibly far fewer. Such an international convention as I envisage could swallow up the numbers with case and with great benefit - for remember that the people of Hong Kong are among the most industrious in the world. No doubt there would be prolonged argument over which countries should take what numbers, but the great strength of the proposal is that we have time to mount Operation Rescue before 1997 brings the curtain down.

Britain. of course, has the responsibility for proposing such a project. since she has the responsibility for the people of her colony; it is, of course, that latter responsibility that the Government is washing its hands of and/or running away from. But that means that we have the best chance of shaming our government into building the Ark. Remember: the rain comes in 1997.

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