TNAG-2708-FCO40-3914-House-of-Commons-Select-Committee-on-Foreign-Affairs-and-Par-1993 — Page 100

RESTRICTED

B

Background and Argument

3. A visit to Hong Kong by the Foreign Affairs Committee will inevitably be high-profile and excite much speculation in the

In June the local press and more widely in the community. Legislative Council (LegCo) will be in the middle of debating the Governor's constitutional proposals. The process will be delicate and the political atmosphere likely to be volatile. The presence of the FAC during this period would be an additional complicating factor, and could well lead some people into staking out positions in public from which they would find it difficult to retreat. This would further complicate already difficult negotiations in LegCo. We would therefore endorse the Governor's preference for an autumn visit, when the LegCo debate will almost certainly be concluded. We understand that the FAC is still engaged in major enquiries into the United Nations and the former Yugoslavia, so it is quite possible they may not, in any case, be ready for Hong Kong till later in the year.

4.

A further question, raised by Sir R McLaren (Peking telno 74), is whether the FAC should visit Peking as well as Hong Kong,

in as it did last time it conducted an enquiry into Hong Kong, 1989. We could put this to the Clerk of the Committee when we get back to her.

fac.PR.JRB

K. Saunders

KAM Saunders

مطلعها

Y/2

RESTRICTED