CHINESE Premier Li Peng has called for a speeding up of progress in the working panel for the Special Administrative Region (SAR) Government in the light of the deadlock over the Sino-British talks.
In a remark made prior to a crucial British cabinet meeting, the Chinese leader has also accused the British side of violating past agreements.
Mr Li said in an interview with the local Wide Angle monthly magazine that Britain alone should be blamed if the talks on the 1994/95 electoral arrangements for Hong Kong failed.
''We hope agreement can be reached through the negotiations,'' he said. ''But if the talks fail, the responsibility is not on the Chinese side.'' He renewed the accusations that Britain had breached the agreements on the handover, saying ''in dealing with Britain, there is a need to think more [and] to ask more questions''.
In Hong Kong, the Governor, Chris Patten, indicated that the British Prime Minister, John Major, would review with ministers ''how much longer we can go on talking'' in the forthcoming cabinet meeting which he would attend.
In an interview with Wharf Cable, aired last night, Mr Patten was asked what the Government would do if the talks failed and he said: ''We have, of course, considered the prospects of failure.
''The Prime Minister, and his colleagues, will then have to make a decision about how to take things forward and how to establish the broadest base of support in the community for whatever we think is right.'' Commenting on the preparation work for forming the post-1997 government, Mr Li said it was originally planned that the SAR Preparatory Committee would be set up in 1996.