TNAG-2289-FCO40-3293-Future-of-Hong-Kong-Basic-Law-1991 — Page 104

state and

the competance [30]

limitation

of its legislative

is the question which laws of the PRC apply in or in relation to the SAR. For the Chinese it was axiomatic that the Chinese Constitution as a whole would be applicable to the SAR except for the provisions concerning social and economic systems, which would be separately provided for in the Basic Law; in plain terms, the provisions of the Constitution relating to the governmental organs of the state would apply in respect of

[31] the SAR

In the Chinese view, this was so self evident that it would not be necessary to spell it out in the Basic Law [32]

The April 1988 text did, however, consider that some express provision should be made for the application within the SAR of laws which "relate to defence and foreign affairs as well as other laws which give expression to national unity and territorial integrity and which....are outside the limits of the high degree of autonomy" of the SAR. The Hong Kong objection to this descriptive approach was based firmly

based firmly on the Joint. Declaration: "The laws of the Hong Kong Special Adminstrative Region shall be the Basic Law, and the laws previously in force in Hong Kong and laws enacted by the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region legislature.."; any Chinese law which was to apply in the SAR should be specified in the Basic Law or re-enacted by the SAR legislature. The solution was to list the national laws, other than the Constitution, in an Annex to the Basic Law and to include a power to add further laws. For the present only six instruments are listed in the adopted text:

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