China seen adopting softer approach to HK
China seen adopting softer approach to HK
By Tan Ee Lyn
HONG KONG (Reuter): China is showing clear signs of softening its often combative approach to Hong Kong in the countdown to next year's handover, political analysts and politicians say.
The first signals emerged with Foreign Minister Qian Qichen's surprise announcement last month that Beijing was prepared to tolerate dissenting views within the Selection Committee being formed to choose Hong Kong's future leaders.
Signs of Beijing treading a more moderate line were reinforced when it responded to an offer of talks by Hong Kong's Democratic Party -- the first received by the party after a long string of failed attempts.
The trend was enhanced, analysts said, by senior official Lu Ping's conciliatory comments to visiting British Minister for Hong Kong, Jeremy Hanley, in Beijing on Tuesday.
Lu, who has refused to meet Governor Chris Patten and had lost no opportunity to verbally attack the last British governor, told Hanley that Patten would be welcome at Hong Kong's handover ceremony next year.
Lu even said he would was looking forward to shaking Patten's hand.
China had previously objected to Patten's presence at the ceremony -- which has been held hostage by animosity between the two sovereign powers. The distrust has meant that the two have yet to agree what form the function would take.
"This is a smart move by Beijing. It puts China in a moderate light," said Peter Cheung, an associate professor of political science at the University of Hong Kong.
China told Hong Kong's Democratic Party on Monday it hoped the party could join the work of preparing and building the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (SAR) after the handover.
But it also stuck to its guns by insisting that before talks can begin, the party would first have to abide by rules governing the set up of a Selection Committee to choose the territory's future leaders.
The Selection Committee is a 400-member body responsible for naming Hong Kong's first post-handover leader and a provisional legislature that would replace the current elected chamber after the handover at midnight on June 30, 1997.
The Democratic Party, whose leaders have been branded subversives by Beijing, is adamantly opposed to the dissolution of the elected chamber. While welcoming the opportunity for a dialogue, it is declining to take part in the Selection Committee.
"The more moderate (Beijing) leaders are beginning to realize what's at stake and they realize they have to start taking a more moderate approach," said Michael DeGolyer, associate professor at Hong Kong's Baptist University who is in charge of a long-term study into the transition.
China's aim of reunification with Hong Kong and Taiwan and the high political stakes involved indicated Beijing was more willing to accommodate a wider spectrum of views if that ensures a stable transition, said political commentator Terry Cheng.
"It seems that within the Chinese leadership, the line of greater openness and tolerance has triumphed over the tougher line," he said.
However, some wondered if the softer stance would be a permanent policy shift.
"If it is a move by (President) Jiang Zemin and Qian, then it has a more solid foundation and it becomes a policy towards Hong Kong. If it's only Qian's initiative, then it becomes more tenuous," DeGolyer said.