TNAG-2223-FCO40-3194-Political-relations-between-Hong-Kong-and-Japan-1991 — Page 47

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CALL ON TSUTOMU‍ HATA, 13 MAY 1991

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Pe. JI HORY

I accompanied the Minister and Mr Lee of the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office on this call to discuss progress towards the establishment of a Hong Kong-Japan Parliamentary League. The main purpose was for Mr Lee to hand over documents in Japanese explaining Hong Kong's administration and government and the Anglo-Chinese Joint Declaration, which Mr Hata requested at our last meeting. Mr Lee also gave him copies of the Joint Declaration and the Basic Law in Japanese.

2. Mr Hata seemed genuinely impressed that the documents had been put into Japanese. He also appreciated points made by the Minister about the importance for Hong Kong's future of countries like Japan being involved there and taking an interest, which might help in influencing China's moves. was particularly important to speak out in support of Hong Kong's economic independence. We appreciated what Mr Nakayama said recently in Peking.

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3. Mr Hata said he would call a meeting of those Dietmen who were interested in participating in a parliamentary league and would use the documents as a basis for discussion. He was also receptive to an offer from Mr Lee to make a presentation to the group (through an interpreter) and to show slides and a video about Hong Kong. On the question of opposition members joining the group, Mr Hata said he planned to involve members of the three major non- communist opposition parties, and that he had already had positive responses from one or two members of the SDPJ and Komeito with whom he had had a private word.

4. The Minister also brought up the outstanding invitation to Dietmen in the group to visit Hong Kong in the near future. Mr Hata himself will be busy putting together a bill for political reform until the end of June and is pushing for an Extraordinary Diet session to be opened in mid-July. He was pessimistic about the chances of this happening (see following comments) but if it did he and others would not be able to get away until September, which he appreciated was when the LEGCO elections would be taking place. He suggested, however, that he might be able to get two groups of 5 or 6 to travel to Hong Kong in early summer, and would canvas people at the meeting he planned to hold. He promised to let us know.

5. More generally, on political reform Mr Hata sounded fairly depressed about the prospects. He was still pushing for an Extraordinary Diet session in early rather than late

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