Thatcher warns against leaving legal vacuum

LADY Thatcher last night warned Hong Kong could not tolerate a legal vacuum after 1997 and made a powerful call for Britain and China to put aside their differences for the sake of progress in the Joint Liaison Group.

With a force that recalled some of her prime ministerial style, she insisted Hong Kong's reputation would be seriously damaged by any suggestion that contracts were awarded unfairly.

And throwing her full weight behind Governor Chris Patten's moves to bring greater democracy to the territory, she said the Basic Law stated 'absolutely clearly' that the ultimate aim was the election of all members of the legislature by universal suffrage.

'I hope that when China resumes responsibility for Hong Kong in 1997,' she said, in a warm expression of support for Mr Patten, 'it will conclude that - whatever it may say now - Hong Kong's people have earned the right to move ahead as rapidly as possible towards the agreed goal'.

In typically robust fashion, Lady Thatcher said the JLG's failure to settle the practical issues of the handover effectively and rapidly 'really must be put right'.

She told the Asia Society: 'A society which depends on the rule of law cannot tolerate a vacuum or uncertainty either in its international obligations or in all the many day-to-day issues which affect business and thereby prosperity.' Expressing the hope that talks between Foreign Secretary Douglas Hurd and his Chinese counterpart Qian Qichen would be a step in the direction of renewing the good Sino-British relations enjoyed after the 1984 agreement, she said the Joint Declaration had stood the test of the past decade 'remarkably well'.