512
CHINA AND THE CUSTOMS
TARIFFS.
THE HONGKONG WEEKLY PRESS AND employed in the collection of taxes and dues which the Article prohibits were to have been removed from their posts. But these (Daily Press, June 16th.)
conditions were not fulfilled. The United There has been some reference in the States and Japan made new Treaties with Chinese Press lately to an effort which the China in 1903 consenting to pay the same Chinese Government has been making in the surtax as Great Britain by way of compensa. direction of fulfilling the engagement. it en- tion to China for the complete abolition of tered into by the MACKAY Treaty of 1902 to Likin, and Portugal did the same in 1904, permanently abolish the likin system. China, but no new Treaties have been made with it seems, has desired a Conference of the the other Treaty Powers. As, however, it has Treaty Powers with a view to securing an recently been announced that all the Powers agreement for an increase in the Customs have agreed with the exception of Germany, duties preliminary to the abolition of the
we presume there has been an exchange Likin barriers. It is stated that China | of Dinlomatic Notes. It may further will agree to totally abolish Likin as soon be pointed out that the new Treaties as she has entered into a definite agreement to which we have referred give liberty to with the Powers for an increase in the either of the High Contracting Parties to Customs duties, as only in this event can the demand a revision of the tariff at the end central Government secure sufficient income of ten years from the date of the exchange to carry these reforms into effect. It is not of ratifications. Presumably the underlving clear from the published statements re-assumption of this provision was that Likin garding this abortive effort to convene a Conference what China's attitude really is. in lieu thereof would have been in vogue, There is the statement that the British and at the end of ten years both China and Government is opposed to the suggestion the Powers would be in a position to see of a Conference on the ground that so long how the new arrangement had worked, and as China has failed to abolish Likin barriers if unsatisfactory to either party, the provision and to bring about reform of the currency offered the opportunity for a revision. But and other reforms provided in the MACKAY Likin has not been abolished and the surtax Treaty, Great Britain does not consider that has therefore not teen imposed. It will be China has a right to ask for tariff increase. time enough to increase the Customs duties We take it then that the proposal of the when these things have been done, and not Chinese Government is for an increase of hefore. We take this to be the attitude of the duties before Likin is abolished-a the British Government towards the pro- reversal of the order of things laid downposal which China has made for a conference in the MACKAY Treaty. When Likin of the Powers on this subject. barriers are permanently abolished on all roads, railways and waterways in the Eighteen Provinces of China and the Three
а
Eastern Provinces, the British Government by the MACKAY Conven- tion consented, in return, to allow surtax, in excess of the Tariff rates for the time being in forer, to be imposed on foreign goods imported by British subjects, and a surtax in addition to the export duty on Chinese produce destined for export ahrond or coastwise. Therefore when it is stated that "before China can bring about the reforms mentioned in the MACKAY Treaty she must have the definite assurance of the Powers that they will agree to customs increase to a reasonable extent," the reply, so far as Great Britain 14 concerned, is that the MACKAY Treaty contains this definite assurance. Article VIII, section 2, states that "the British Government agree that foreign goods on importation in addition to the effective 5 per cent. import duty as provided for in the Protocol of 1901 shall pay a special surtax equivalent to one and a half times the said duty to compensate for the abolition of Likin." Chinese papers have represented that the British and the German Ministers are opposing the abolition of Likin. What Sir JOHN JORDAN is opposing is rather, it would seem, a proposal to raise the Customs duties before the Chinese Government has fulfilled its obligation to abolish Likio, which was the condition precedent to the British Government's consent to the increase of the Customs duties. It should, how
|
would have been abolished and the surtax
THE JAPANESE RESIDENCY
GENERAL IN KOREA.
[June 21, 1909.
history was a perpetual repetition of the same talb: plot, counterplot, insurrection and foreign complications," and though we have not yet heard the last of insurrection. ary movements, Korea has ceased to be regarded as the powder magazine of the
True, the effect East.
of Japan's
A8
of
policy is for the present, the virtual annexation the country so long her people are unfitted to govern. AS PRINCE ITO once declared "the identity of Korean and Japanese interests in the Far East, and the paramount character of Japanese interests in Korea, will not permit Japun to leave Korea to the care of any other foreign country: she must assume the charge herself." Her assumption of that charge has been both a gain to peace and a benefit to the trade, not only of Japan, but of other foreign Powers besides, as the annual trade returns clearly demonstrate. Aud now that PRINOE ITO is retiring from the position of virtual monarch of Korea, the first thought of the peaceful com- mercial nations of the world will, we think, be one of gratitude for the good he has undoubtedly accomplished, followed by the fervent hope that the future develop ment of his plans in Korea will continue to be attended with the same beneficent results.
•
THE ANTI-OPIUM MOVEMENT,
(Daily Press, 18th June.) We do not see much in the Chinese Press at the present time about the Anti-Opium Campaign, nor is much heard about it. But what little information is published on the subject from time to time does not give one as much progress is the impression that being made as the declarations a few months ago prepared us to expect. For instance, our Canton correspondent yesterday men- tioned that when the police authorities at Fatshan announced last week that the new licenses for smokers were ready and that it would be henceforth an offence to smoke pium without a licence, thousands of persons besieged the police offices for licences, and the entire supply fell far short of meeting the actual
1
demand.
It can safely be said that so long as the drug is procurable, so long will there be opiám smokers in China, and the glow. ing accounts of a great renunciation on the
(Daily Press, June 17th.) Prince Iro's resignation of the high and responsible post of Resident-General in Korea, which he has held for three years, is not an unexpected event and therefore creates no surprise. As Japanese statesmen go, His Excellency is an old man, being seventy-eight years of age, and now that he has set up the new machinery of govern- ment in Korea, and largely imbued the | Korean nation with a sense of Japan's friendly concern for her welfare and development as a nation, His Excellency doubtless feels that he can safely leave the further development of his plans to VISCOUNT SONE, who has been his chief art of opium amokers are to be heavily lieutenant. But the Grand Old Man is not diecounted. This incident at Fatshan illus- retiring from public life, and in his new trates the untrustworthiness of Chinese appointment as President of the Privy official information in regard to the subject. Council the nation has the assurance that In the belief that they were well informed he will still exercise a watchful and a as to the number of people addicted to potent influence in the development of the smoking opium, the police authorities had great scheme of reform in Korea with provided themselves with what they doubt. which his name will ever he honourably less regarded as an ample supply of licences ssociated. His retirement from the post-and to their amazement they discovered of Resilent-General simply means for him that the estimate was hopelessly inadequate. well-earned relief from the onerous and What has occurred at Fatahan is possible in exacting detail work of administration. He many other towns in China, and it will has mapped out the way of progress, set the probably Le found, as more trustworthy machinery of the new administration in information based on the issue of licences motion, and he leaves behind him in Seoul comes to hand, that the success of the appeal experienced administrators who have had to the Chinese people throughout the empire the benefit of his inspiration and guidance. to give up the practice of opium smoking has been largely over-stated. We put less faith in voluntary abstention by audden resolve than in the gradual weaning process enjoined by the growing cost of the drug as supplies diminish. The British import of opium is diminishing by one-tenth a year. China, it has been affirmed, is abandoning the cultivation of the poppy at a still more rapid rate, but it must not be for- gotten that China grows at least six times more opium thau is imported into the country. A year ago optimistic leaders of the anti-opium movement in China were
PRINCE ITO's task in Korea has been one
which demanded the highest qualities of statesmanship, and even the stcutest critics of Japan's policy in Korea can have nothing but admiration for the manner in which the venerable statesmau has discharged the responsible duties he undertook; nor can Japan's claim that she has already effected
ever, be added that the condition on which the Chinese Government entered into these engagements Was that all Powers, entitled to most favoured nation treatment in China also entered into the same engagements as Great Britain with regard to the payment of surtaxes and other obligations imposed by Article VIII of the British Treaty. Subject to these great improvement in the political and provisions the arrangements provide for in social conditions of the country be con- the Article were to come into force of 1st | troverted. Before Japan took the respon- January 1904, by which date all Likin si ility of intervening in Korean affairs it barriers were to be removed and the officials I is undeniable that Korean political
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