TNAG-2798-FCO40-4038-Hong-Kong-six-monthly-meetings-of-foreign-ministers-1993 — Page 63

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I submit a draft telegram.

This advice

reflects the views of HKD and FED.

We have also

consulted the Governor and the Embassy in Peking, who

agree.

Argument

4.

A meeting on or about 21 May is not ideal from

the point of view of doing useful business on Hong Kong,

given that the third round of talks in Peking will be

held from 21 to 23 May. But we and the Governor

consider that if the Security Council meeting does take

place, it would not be understood in Hong Kong if we

missed the opportunity for a bilateral with Qian. There

is unlikely to be another equally convenient one this

side of the summer break.

5.

On substance, we believe that the meeting should

cover the full range of our dealings with China, namely

Hong Kong; other bilateral issues; and international

topics. On Hong Kong, the constitutional issues will clearly be the main focus. This meeting should not

become part of the negotiations.

The objective should

rather be to give political impetus to the talks by

reinforcing the main points in the Secretary of State's

message to Qian, ie that we are not prepared to go on

arguing endlessly about principles; and that if the Chinese side are willing to tell us what arrangements

they could accept in practice, they will find us open-minded and constructive.

The fixing of a bilateral

will probably mean that we do not get a written response

to the Secretary of State's message from Qian

beforehand. It will also mean that the talks in Peking

have to mark time, at least for their first day and

possibly for the whole of the third round.

But we

CONFIDENTIAL