•
EXTRATERRITORIALITY
NORWEGIAN REPLY.
47
The following is the English translation of the reply of the Norwegian Government to China's Note concerning the abolition of extraterritoriality.
Légation de Norvége
Peking, Aug. 14, 1929.
I have the honour to acknowledge the receipt of Your Excellency's note of April 27 expressing on behalf of the Chinese Government the desire of China to have the restriction on her jurisdictional sovereignty removed and the hope that the Norwegian Government will take this desire into immediate and sympathetic consideration in order to enable China to assume jurisdiction over all nationals within her domain
Having communicated the contents of the Note to my Government I am now instructed to recall to Your Excellency that the Norwegian Government has already, in concluding, on November 12 last year, a new treaty with the Chinese Government, given concrete evidence of the friendly feeling which Norway has always entertained towards China and the Chinese people.
My Government now desires me to reiterate, the assurance, already ex- pressed on that occasion, that the same friendly feelings will not be found to have changed when the question of revising other clauses of the treaty of 1847 between Norway and China is brought up for discussion.
As to the question of removing the restrictions on China's jurisdictional sovereignty (by relinquishing the consular jurisdiction) this question was already given sympathetic consideration when, in 1926, a Norwegian delegate joined the international Commission to inquire into extraterritorial jurisdic- tion in China.
I may add that the administration of the Norwegian jurisdiction in China has never been extended beyond the purpose for which it was introduced, and I am directed to state in conclusion that my Government has no desire to maintain the Consular Court longer than considered_necessary and is pre- pared to abolish the same when all the other Treaty Powers will do so.
Monsieur le Ministre:
(Signed) N. AALL,
Charge d'Affaires a.i.
CHINESE REPLY TO AMERICA.
Nanking, September 5, 1929.
I have the honour to acknowledge the receipt of your Excellency's Note of August 10th in which you are good enough to transmit to me the views of your Government in regard to the request of the Chinese Government, con- tained in my Note of April 27, for the removal of restrictions on China's juris- dictional sovereignty.
The Chinese Government is pleased to be reminded by the American Gov- ernment that it has, for some time past, given constant and sympathetic con- sideration to the national aspirations of the people of China and that it has repeatedly given concrete evidence of its desire to promote the realisation of those aspirations. The traditional friendship between China and America has not only a common material basis, but is also deeply rooted in the idealisın which is common to the Chinese and the American people. The American peo- ple, with their love of liberty, their zeal for justice, their desire to further the advance of civilisation and their sympathy for the aspirations of nations in their spiritual re-birth all of which reveal unmistakably the noble attitude of the American mind, have aroused the admiration and won the love of the Chinese people. This idealism has manifested itself in the abolition of slavery, the growth of democracy, and the endeavour to establish a reign of universal