Recd. 13/11/91
HKB 182 13:
RECEIVED Ja Et
15 NOV 991
PERSONAL & CONFIDENTIAL
RA Burns Esq
AUSS
FCO
BRITISH TRADE COMMISSION
M. Ricketts: HMD
HONG KONG.
8 November 1991
RA3
13/25
131
AT 13/4 Vee 23/land Caithness
of Bayne sin's cores of
HAVERD
Den Ander,
MAJOR HONG KONG PROJECT WORK: BRITISH INTERESTS
1.
J
Thank you for your helpful and sympathetic letter of 24 October. I appreciate this insight into your thinking in London and also of course your kind words about my reporting.
2. As my recent telegrams have sought to underline, these projects and particularly those associated with the Airport and related developments, do not stand still. The crunch time will be upon us for most of them in the coming months. Therefore things have moved on since your letter, and you will be aware of the new developments, and of my comments arising from them, in respect of both the Airport related projects and the power stations, from my various telegrams.
3. The question of ECGD backing for our companies bidding for these mega projects is clearly going to loom very large indeed. You will have noted from my telegram Otter 197 of 21 October that the French have already assured the Hong Kong Government that ful1 COFACE support is guaranteed for any of their companies bidding for any part of the Airport project. As reported, that assurance was given by an appropriately senior French official. I did not in the telegram detail the circumstances of that guarantee. What particularly impressed Richard Allen was that Desponts walked into the room, sat down for the meeting, and said, before a word had been said to him, that he wanted to clear one thing out of the way before being asked. All French companies have the full backing of the French Government and COFACE support is guaranteed for them all. Allen told me that the next day the French Consulate General came to him to underline that this was a fully premeditated guarantee to be taken at full face-value.
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