596 { China’s Quest
The dispute between Xu and Li Peng came to a head when Li directed Xu
to demand that the British Hong Kong government outlaw an organization
that had emerged as a very large prodemocracy united front. The movement
was led by “radical democrats” who demanded complete direct election of the
both the legislative and executive organs of Hong Kong. The group had suc-
ceeded in mobilizing unprecedentedly large prodemocracy demonstrations
which featured denunciations of CCP policies in both the PRC and Hong
Kong. Xu advised Beijing that it was unlikely that the British Hong Kong gov-
ernment would comply with a request to ban the group, and suggested a less
confrontational wording of the Chinese note. Li Peng insisted, however, and
the Chinese demand that Britain ban the organization was duly delivered. As
Xu expected, it was rejected. Under British law, the organization was allowed
to exist and conduct various legal activities, British representatives explained.
British Hong Kong authorities encouraged the prodemocracy movement by
allowing the use of the Happy Valley Race Course for rallies, yet another
“unprecedented action,” according to Xu.
After this and other similar encounters, Xu Jiatun requested retirement,
which was eventually granted late in 1989. The next year, fearing political re-
prisal because of his close association with Zhao Ziyang if he remained in
China, Xu fled his retirement in Shenzhen, passing through Hong Kong for
political exile in the United States. A member of the CCP’s Central Advisory
Commission and the Central Committee, and a personal friend of Deng
Xiaoping, Xu was the highest-level PRC official ever to defect to the West.^42
He would later join with other dissidents to urge the CCP to return to the
policy directions of Hu Yaobang and Zhao Ziyang, and embrace freedom and
democracy as China’s ultimate goal.Foiling the Putative British Scheme to Bankrupt Hong KongIn the view of Qian Qichen, foreign minister and principal in Beijing’s hand-
ling of the Hong Kong issue after June 1989, the 1984–1988 period was a “hon-
eymoon” in Anglo-Chinese handling of Hong Kong’s reversion.^43 Xu Jiatun
concurred, referring to it as a “short period of cooperation” between Britain
and China. Robin McLaren says that “It is hard to exaggerate the impact” of
6-4, which “made the whole relation with China far more difficult ... Chinese
authorities began to view the territory in a new and more sinister light” as a
potential “base for subversion of the communist system on the mainland.”^44
Construction of a new airport on the west side of Lantao Island was one
point of intense PRC-British conflict in the run-up to reversion. The need for
a new airport was apparent; the old one was in a centrally located, densely
populated area of high-rise apartment buildings, with the approach blocked
by mountains. Mountain removal and reclamation of land from the sea on