Word: hong
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Even the most senior foreign correspondents in Peking were hard pressed to recall any incident to match it. Emerging from two days of discussions with British diplomats last week over the future status of Hong Kong, Chinese Negotiator Yao Guang was besieged so vigorously by reporters from Hong Kong that he was almost knocked to the ground. The startled Yao retreated to the safety of a staircase. "All I can say," he volunteered, "is that the talks are useful and constructive, and we will resume our talks on the 25th of July." With that, the flabbergasted Yao fought...
...encounter was appropriately symbolic. Just as the newsmen from Hong Kong pressed their Chinese hosts, so too in broader ways has the freewheeling British crown colony from which they came. But Britain's lease on most of Hong Kong's territory runs out in 1997, and the Chinese are determined to reimpose their sovereignty. That demand has turned Hong Kong into a city uncertain of its future and worried by the lack of progress in negotiations to resolve it. But now there is at least some cause for hope. After nine months of official silence, Britain and China...
...stake in the discussions is the future of 5.5 million people, most of whom are Chinese citizens. In the past four decades, Hong Kong has become the world's third most important financial capital, after New York and London, and a manufacturing center with exports greater than those of all mainland China. Britain has ruled the colony for 142 years under three treaties signed in the 19th century with imperial China's impotent Qing dynasty. One treaty grants Britain perpetual control over the island of Hong Kong and the tip of the Kowloon Peninsula. Two other pacts provide...
Discussions between Britain and China were deadlocked last October, principally because Peking demanded that Britain recognize the Chinese claim of sovereignty over Hong Kong before talks could proceed. After that breakdown, the colony's economic indicators plummeted to historic lows. The news that Britain and China would resume their talks has produced a recovery. By last week shares on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange reached a nine-month high, and the slumping Hong Kong dollar had improved. Even so, many of the ethnic Chinese businessmen who dominate the colony's economy were still debating whether to invest...
...moot, even though diplomats expect to be negotiating the issue for at least two more years. Britain privately admits that, because of the city's vulnerability, it makes no sense to try to retain the colony. The real issue to be negotiated, therefore, is the shape of a Hong Kong government under Peking's control...