The
Convention confirmed by the Treaty of Nanking. Convention and the Treaty were always denounced by successive Chinese governments, of every variety, as unequal and unjust Those governments derogations from Chinese sovereignty.
never accepted the surrender of Chinese sovereignty over Hong
However, many
Kong both the ceded and the leased parts.
-
parts of the British empire were acquired by treaties no less unequal. Despite that, where territory was acquired by the Crown, its people came under the protection of the Crown and Those people the Parliament and judiciary at Westminster.
or
who lived in the Old dominions (and who were basically of British, at least European ethnicity) acquired a high measure of independence in the 19th century or in the early The inter-War moves towards decades of the 20th century. responsible government in India were accelerated following
World War which so drained
The establishment of the
the conclusion of the Second World
British treasure and resolve. United Nations Organisation in 1945 was effected on the basis of the United Nations Charter. That Charter, the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights and the
International Human
Rights Covenants which followed, committed the post-War era to (amongst other things) respect of the rights of peoples to The United Kingdom, to its honour, has insisted elsewhere throughout its large empire upon the right
of self-determination as the cornerstone
self-determination.
to the process of
decolonisation by which the peoples of the British Empire were brought to independence and self-government.
Kong.
to this story is Hong
A most dishonourable exception to
not prepared for
The people of Hong Kong were
movements
self-government.
Political
were at first
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