December 19 in History
1984 - Chinese Premier Zhao Ziyang and British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher sign the Sino-British Joint Declaration to transfer Hong Kong back to China in 1997
Signed in Beijing, the Sino-British Joint Declaration describes the sovereign and administrative arrangement of Hong Kong after July 1, 1997, when the lease of the New Territories was set to expire according to the Convention for the Extension of Hong Kong Territory. The Declaration came into force when the instruments of ratification were exchanged on May 27, 1985, and was registered by the Chinese and British governments at the United Nations on June 12, 1985. In the Joint Declaration, the Chinese government stated it would resume the exercise of its sovereignty over Hong Kong (including the British territories of Hong Kong Island and Kowloon, and the leased New Territories) from July 1, 1997, and the British Government declared that it would hand over Hong Kong to China on July 1, 1997. The Chinese government also declared its basic policies regarding Hong Kong in the document, where in accordance with the “one country, two systems” principle agreed between the UK and China, the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) would not practise the socialist system in mainland China, and Hong Kong’s existing capitalist system and way of life would be unchanged for 50 years until 2047. The Joint Declaration requires these basic policies to be written in the Hong Kong Basic Law.
-Wikipedia