President Jorge Sampaio of Portugal arrived in a rain-swept Macau last night to return formally the Portuguese enclave to China at midnight tomorrow, thus bringing to an end 450 years of colonial rule.
President Jiang Zemin of China arrives tomorrow to participate in a triumphal flag-raising ceremony marking the end of China's historic humiliations at the hands of foreign powers.
The Beijing government has declared a public holiday on Monday to celebrate the withdrawal of the last European country from Chinese soil, indeed from any part of Asia, for the first time since Portuguese schooners appeared in the South China Sea in the 16th century.
As foreign dignitaries began to arrive, Macau police tracked down and expelled several followers of China's banned Falun Gong movement who were planning a demonstration against the treatment of their members in mainland China to coincide with the handover ceremonies. Six Falun Gong members were put on the ferry to Hong Kong after being detained in Macau yesterday, according to Ms Belinda Pang, a spokeswoman for the sect which practises breathing exercises and elements of Buddhism and Taoism.
Speaking from Hong Kong she said other members remained in Portuguese territory and had applied to the police for permission to hold a legal demonstration.
The East Timor resistance leader, Mr Xanana Gusmao, arrived with the Portuguese President and will meet leaders of the 200-strong East Timor community exiled to Macau during East Timor's 24-year Indonesian occupation, which ended in September.
The Minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr Andrews, will arrive in Macau tomorrow for the ceremonies.
They begin with the lowering of the green and red Portuguese flag at 7 p.m. and the raising of the red flag of communist China at midnight.
At that moment Macau will become a Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China, and the outgoing Portuguese governor, Gen Rocha Vieira, will hand over control of the city to its Beijing-approved chief executive, Mr Edmund Ho.
Soldiers of the People's Liberation Army will march into Macau at midday on Monday to establish a garrison which will help the police combat crime in the gambling enclave. Unlike the handover of Hong Kong to China in July 1997, which was preceded by acrimonious exchanges between the outgoing governor, Mr Chris Patten, and the Beijing leadership, the transfer of Macau to Chinese sovereignty is taking place in an atmosphere of goodwill.
Ironically, the EU will be represented at the handover by Mr Patten, who is now the European Commissioner for Foreign Affairs. Before leaving for Macau, Mr Patten told MEPs he welcomed the new era that was about to begin.
The situation would change, but "in crucial respects life must remain the same", especially as regards freedoms and fundamental rights, he said.
Mr Patten called for full implementation of the joint declaration, under which Macau, which has a partly elected legislature, will retain its government, laws and capitalist ways for 50 years. Should the values they defended be threatened, "then we shall speak out", Mr Patten said, echoing his promises to Hong Kong people.
The Hong Kong experience proved fears about freedom of religion were unfounded, he noted, adding: "Next Sunday I shall personally attend Sunday mass in Macau."
Unlike Hong Kong, Macau does not have a significant pro-democracy movement. Hong Kong newspapers reported yesterday that members of the former British colony's Democratic Party would not be welcome at the handover ceremony.
Macau's leading pro-democracy legislator, Mr Antonio Ng, yesterday criticised the police ban on Falun Gong protests.
This was clearly a political decision by Portugal to prevent a protest to mar the handover ceremonies, he said, pointing out that Macau had not outlawed Falun Gong.
The handover will be marked by what Macau describes as a "spectacular cultural event" involving 1,000 schoolchildren in a dragon dance, a wharf-side scene depicting Chinese and Portuguese sailors bartering silver, porcelain and silk 400 years ago, and the arrival of Catholic missionaries.
About 30,000 people, mainly from selected work units, will be brought to Tiananmen Square in Beijing for a festival centred on a giant television which will screen the handover live.
The return of Macau leaves only Taiwan outside the jurisdiction of Beijing in its goal of unifying the "motherland".