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Following is the transcript of the meet-the-media session given by the Chief Executive, Mr Tung Chee Hwa, at the Hong Kong Macau Centre at the end of his duty visit to Beijing:

Reporter: Mr Tung, will you just tell us what the result of this visit in plain, and what sets this visit apart from the other one you have had up here?

Chief Executive: Well, of course, this visit is an official visit. The last time I had an official visit was December last year. This is the second official visit. The last one was 10 months ago. The purpose of this duty visit is really to report to the central leadership about what has developed over the last 10 months since I had been here. Of course, the issue we talked about is how well "one country, two systems" and sovereignty are implemented in Hong Kong. And we also talked at length about the international financial turmoil, how has it affected Hong Kong, and what we have done over the last so many months in face of this external economic turmoil. I also had a chance to understand despite the turmoil and despite the ravaging flood that the country's economy is still going strong, and that World Bank had in fact predicted that by end of this year, China will be the sixth largest economic entity. Of course, that is very important to Hong Kong because as Hong Kong develops further, China's continued economic growth would help Hong Kong in our own economy. This young lady asked me earlier on what is the difference between this visit and the last visit. Of course, the last visit was done in December and that the impact of the financial turmoil was just beginning to be felt; whereas this one is very different. It's 10 months afterwards. And then you know what the turmoil had done to Hong Kong. So it was different, but nevertheless, challenge brings the best out of people. And I think Hong Kong people will live up to the challenge and very successfully overcome this.

Reporter: Did the subject of the collapse of Gitic come up in your discussions and the impact of that collapse and weakness in the other Gitics, many of them...may have on Hong Kong?

Chief Executive: There was no specific discussion on Gitic as such. But let me tell you this that I think the cleansing of Gitic or the reorganisation or the collapse of Gitic, fundamentally, it is a good thing because it shows the determination of the Central Government to ensure that the reform in the area of finance and economy must go ahead, and I think it is a very good thing for China as a whole and obviously also for Hong Kong. Thank you very much.

Note: Please also refer to the Chinese transcript which will be issued shortly.

End/Saturday, October 17, 1998

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