摘自一个马来西亚记者的文章：

http://www.newsabahtimes.com.my/nstweb/fullstory/9290

China preferred the term "reversion", while Britain employed the term “handover” to describe Hong Kong’s transfer from British to Chinese hands. Actually, it could be said that both sides were right in their assertion. Historically, Hong Kong Island was permanently ceded by China to Britain in the Treaty of Nanking of 1842 after the Opium War, while Kowloon Peninsula (south of Boundary Street in what is bustling Mong Kok today) was also permanently ceded in the Convention of Peking in 1860. As such, they became sovereign British soils.

Only the New Territories north of Boundary Street were“leased”to Britain in 1898 for 99 years. But few lay persons paid attention to the fine print of the early Anglo-Chinese political settlements on Hong Kong. As such, legalistically, Britain was only obliged to “revert” New Territories to China in 1997, and legislation was actually passed in Westminster to “cede” the rest of Hong Kong to China. Both sides finally settled on the term “transfer of sovereignty” of Hong Kong.