**********************

The following is the transcript of remarks by the Chief Executive, Mr Tung Chee Hwa, at a media session after meetings with President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao in Beijing today (July 19):

Chief Executive: I arrived in Beijing this morning and it is a duty visit. I take the opportunity of my visit to Beijing to report to President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao about what happened lately in Hong Kong and what are the steps I am taking in Hong Kong; about our issues such as what we are doing about Article 23; about how I plan to improve the governance of Hong Kong; and also how we can move forward more rapidly in the economic restructuring of Hong Kong; a process which is still very painful.

With regard to what had happened in Hong Kong and the step that I have been taking, I am not going to talk about it now because I have spoken at length in Hong Kong already, recently. I do want to tell you that the President and the Premier have a full grasp of what is happening in Hong Kong and they obviously care very much for the well being of Hong Kong. They emphasised that they have total confidence in me and the SAR Government in taking Hong Kong forward in completing Hong Kong's economic restructuring. And, they also made the point that the Central Government would support the measures to help Hong Kong's economic recovery and restructuring. They pointed out that in the process of economic revival, social stability is important. I reported to the President and the Premier that I have every confidence to lead Hong Kong forward to make economy recovery, to help economic recovery and to overcome all the difficulties that we are facing now.

The CEPA was signed on June 29 in Hong Kong. At that time I spoke with the Premier, he was in Hong Kong at that time, about how we can accelerate the implementation of the CEPA agreement and also what next step we can do to widen, enrich the CEPA agreement to cover more areas. I am happy to tell you in today's meeting, the Premier said to me that he will agree to expand the market access, the market for Hong Kong in areas such as telecommunication, tourism and also financial services. When I get back to Hong Kong, I will immediately put our efforts into motion to get these areas moving and may be in a few weeks' time, I will be able to tell you all the details of what this would mean for Hong Kong, new opportunities for Hong Kong. You can see the very quick response from the Premier.

The leadership really cares about Hong Kong, really wants to help Hong Kong in its economic restructuring. I do want to say we are facing some really serious challenges and, at the end of the day, how Hong Kong becomes successful, how we overcome the challenges, is really up to us. It is really up to us. What I will do, I will promise you, is that, in terms of improving governance, I will do my very best to ensure this will happen with me and with my colleagues, and I am quite confident that we will be able to overcome the difficulties and complete our restructuring and move forward with confidence. Thank you very much.

(Please also refer to the Chinese portion)

End/Saturday, July 19, 2003

NNNN