TNAG-2004-FCO40-2852-Hong-Kong-political-parties-1990 — Page 91

I appreciate that you may feel constrained in commenting on this matter as the case is now sub judice. Nevertheless, I must express my strongest concern over the Hong Kong government's actions in this matter. It is extremely worrying that the Hong Kong Government should seek to suppress the freedom of expression, in a way that can only serve to make it easier for the Chinese government to do the same thing after 1997. The use of outdated statutes that the government has themselves decreed to be against their own Bill of Rights makes the matter even more worrying.

Finally there is the question of timing. I am bound to share the view prevalent in Hong Kong that the British Government are once again kowtowing to pressure from the Chinese Government, instead of standing up for basic beliefs and rights which we would like to see preserved after 1997, not undermined by Britain before then.

This action can only serve to undermine further Hong Kong's confidence in the British Government, to question our commitment to democratic institutions and a free society, and to play into the hands of the government in China.

You

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