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The following is the transcript of the media session on the Court of Final Appeal (CFA) ruling given by the Chief Executive, Mr Tung Chee Hwa, at Central Government Offices this (Wednesday) afternoon:-

Recently, the decision of the Court of Final Appeal has given rise to wide concerns among our community as a whole. It has also led to some new questions that need to be answered, and, in fact, new situations have arisen.

Implementing "one country, two systems" and the Basic Law is an enterprise unprecedented in history. In the process, it is inevitable that some new phenomena will arise. The decision of the Court of Final Appeal on January 29 is an example of this.

I am confident that because we adhere to the principle of "one country, two systems" and the constitutional basis which the Basic Law has provided to Hong Kong, we can solve any problems or any situations that we face. Why am I so confident? My confidence is based on our success in implementing "one country, two systems" principle and the Basic Law in Hong Kong over the 19 months in the past.

In the past few days, I have kept in touch with the Central Authorities and have arranged for Secretary for Justice to visit Beijing as my representative to communicate further with relevant departments of the Central Authorities. The date and details of the visit will be announced very, very shortly.

So, this is my statement and I will be very happy to answer a few questions.

Reporter: Chinese legal experts have said that the judgement, or the ruling of verdict has to be reversed. What message is the Secretary for Justice going to bring into China? What is she going to tell them?

Mr Tung: We are going to exchange views to communicate with each other and then the purpose is really to understand. As I have said in Chinese just now and I would say this in English, that implementation of "one country, two systems" concept and the Basic Law is an unprecedented historic undertaking and naturally in the process, there will be new situations as we are facing today. But I've said also earlier on that I have every confidence that these issues can be resolved.

Reporter: In what way will it be resolved? How would it be resolved?

Mr Tung: Let me tell you that the issues are not simple. They are not simple issues and that it may take a bit of time for all the complex issues to be resolved, but I have every confidence that they will be resolved.

Reporter: Would you.... support the Court of Final Appeal ruling and do you stand by the independence of the Hong Kong Judiciary?

Mr Tung: As I have said earlier on that all these sort of issues, there's no side to it. The issue is that this is the "one country, two systems", implementation is an unprecedented historic enterprise and new situation is bound to arise and what happened on January 29 is a very good example of that and we are trying to find a way forward and I have every confidence we would find the way forward. Thank you very much.

End/Wednesday, February 10, 1999

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Chief Executive's media session on Court of Final Appeal ruling (Chinese part)