TNAG-2707-FCO40-3913-Hong-Kong-political-parties-Cooperative-Resources-Centre-(CR-1993 — Page 7

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(h)

(4)

that our principle should still be that it would be important for Hong Kong cfficials to participate in the talks. We must have our backbone. Progress on the talks about talks had gone smoothly until 12 March when the gap had widened as a result of the Chinese side changing its position. Nonetheless, notwithstanding what Director Lu Ping had said the previous day, China had caly said that talks would now be difficult but not that there would be no talks. The door had not been closed yet although it seemed unlikely that talks could take place in the next few weeks.

Mra Selina Chow said that we should be aware that China also had internal problems and differences. Mrs Miriam Lau asked whether Hong Kong had made any assessment on the possible damage as a a result of the current political situation. The Governor said that we had completed a discussion on this recently with particular reference to various developmental projects.

The CRC members present urged the Governor not to give up on talks. The Governor said that he would ap to . He also asked the Legislative Council members whether there was anything he had said on 12 March which they thought was wrong. Mrs Selina Chow said that events before 12 March had given the impression to a lot of people that the differences between Britain and China had been narrowing and that the only outstanding issue was the composition of the team. The announcement to gazette had therefore come as a very big surprise to a lot of people. The Governor said that we had set out our terms for the talks and it had been strange to see China finding our terms unreasonable. The only explanation for this was that some Chinese officials wanted to scuttle the talks.

(j) Both Mr. Allen Lee and the Governor agreed that

the events connected with China over the last few days had been regrettable. Mrs Selina Chow hoped that the British side would act quickly to overcome the current problems apart from saying that we remained ready for talks. The Governor said that we would need to consider whether and when to introduce the Bill to the Legislative Council.

CONFIDENTIAL

CONFIDE