Foreign and Commonwealth Office
London SW1A 2AH
Telephone 01.
A C Galsworthy Esq
Office of the British Senior
Representative
Sino-British Joint Liaison Group Hong Kong
SINO-BRITISH NEGOTIATIONS
Your reference
Our reference
Date
112
(113
Fill
Ink 8261
071 210 6213
19-October 1990
HKC040/4
USTRY
RECEN
18 JAN 1991
"STRY
on Taken
1. I am replying to your letter of 12 October to Ken Walker, about Hua Guofeng's visit to Europe. I attach lists of high level visits exchanged between China and the four countries Hua visited on his tour (Britain, Italy, France and West Germany). In both the French and the German cases there had been previous high level visits to which Hua could possibly be said to be reciprocating. The next senior French visitor was President Giscard d'Estaing in 1980. In the Italian case, President Pertini visited in 1980, though there was not a Prime Ministerial visit until 1986. The West German President Karstens visited October 1982, one month after Mrs Thatcher's visit, and Chancellor Kohl did not go until 1984, although Chancellor Schmidt had visited in 1975.
in
2. The pattern is not at all clear. We could be said to have been slower than the French or the Italians, although Presidential visits might not be in exactly the same category as Prime Minister's. We were marginally quicker than the Germans.
3. We do not have material on our files to check out your recollections of the discussions surrounding the Prime Minister's visit. I have called for the entered files relating to that visit and will send you the results of my researches in due
course.
MJ Mellho.
ل
Mark Matthews
Far Eastern Section
RAD
SOJAAK
No comments yet.
Private notes are available after approval.