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[This Document is the Property of His Britannic Majesty's Government.]
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CHINA RAILWAYS.
CONFIDENTIAL.
9150
[February 9]
SECTURE12 MAR 07,
[4511]
No. 1.
Consul-General Wilkinson to Sir Edward Grey.-(Received February 9, 1907.)
(No. 34.) Sir,
Yünnan-fu, December 19, 1906. WITH reference to my immediately preceding despatch, I have the honour to inclose copy of a Report which I have addressed to His Majesty's Minister at Peking on a successful Petition to the Governor-General here to memoralize the Throne for a Decree commanding all railways in Yunnan Province, other than the French line from Tonquin, to be constructed solely by the Chinese.
I have, &c. (Signed)
W. H. WILKINSON.
Inclosure 1 in No. 1.
Consul-General Wilkinson to Sir J. Jordan.
(No. 49.) Sir,
Yunnan-fu, December 14, 1906. REFERRING to my immediately preceding despatch, I have the honour to inclose a Memorandum giving abstracts or translations of two editorials that have lately appeared in the semi-official "Tien-nan Ch'ao-pao,' or "Yunnan Gazette,' the subject of the Tengyuch Railway.
11
on
The first is of very considerable importance, as it embodies the text of a Report to the Governor-General by the Superintendent of the local Bureau of Agriculture, Trade, and Industry, praying that his Excellency will memorialize the Throne for a Decree commanding that all railways in Yunnan Province, with the exception of that from Tonquin, shall be built by the Chinese themselves. The date of this Report does not appear, but the editor of the "Gazette states that the indorsement of the Governor-General ran: "A Memorial will be presented in the sense of this Petition."
As far back as the 10th May last (in the despatch to the Government of Burmah inclosed in my Report to Mr. Carnegie No. 16 of the 11th May), I wrote:-
"If we continue to delay such demand" (for equal treatment with the French) "the Peking Government may issue orders that all future railways in Yünnan are to be built solely with Chinese capital."
You have done me the honour to inform me (by your telegram No. 19 of the 30th November) that the whole railway question is under consideration by the Foreign Office; but I am unaware whether the Wai-wu Pu has admitted that the communi- cations exchanged in March 1902 with Sir Ernest Satow give us the right to equal treatment with France as regards railway construction in Yunnan. If the Wai-wu Pa has admitted this, then it will be vain for Governor-General Ting to memorialize in the sense desired by the Directors of the "Yünnan-Szechuan and Tengyueh Railways Company." But if no such formal admission has been made, it is to be feared lest the Decree will issue, aud that the Wai-wu Pu will then adduce it as an insurmountable obstacle to any demand on our part, however modest and however justifiable.
Accordingly, I ventured to telegraph to you on the 7th instant, reporting the assent of the Governor-General to the Petition and submitting that the Wai-wu Pu should be warned beforehand that we could not recognize any such Decree.
I had the honour to receive yesterday your telegram saying that
you had reminded the Wai-wu Pu of the engagement of 1902 and had warned them against the issue of the Decree.
[2368 i-5]
I have, &c. (Signed)
W. H. WILKINSON.