TNAG-2732-FCO40-3938-Future-of-Hong-Kong-constitutional-development-1993 — Page 46

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Legislative Council before the end of the current

session (mid July).

(v) That if an understanding on all or any of our

objectives can be reached with the Chinese, it should be

made public in a suitable statement, in which we will

undertake to recommend to LegCo draft legislation on the proposed 1994/95 electoral arrangements which reflected

such an understanding.

(vi) To press the Chinese for public assurances that:

- any member of the 1995 Legislative Council who in

1997 pledges to uphold the Basic Law thereby meets

the requirement of the Basic Law for service in the

first LegCo of the SAR in 1997 (ie the procedure

envisaged in the Basic Law for approval would

effectively be reduced to a formality).

- the Chinese side will be prepared in principle to

accept universal suffrage in Hong Kong at the

earliest time permitted by the Basic Law (ie 2007).

if an agreement were to be reached on a method of

forming the Election Committee for 1995, the

Chinese would use the same model for constituting

the "Selection Committee" for the first Chief

Executive and the Election Committee for future

Chief Executives and these Committees would select

the Chief Executives by open election rather than

by consultation.

Our specific objectives for the first phase of

discussions are:

steeringbrief 15.2

NH

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