P Y.
fidential.
2890/1908.
Sir,
TREC
C. O.
34502
RnX 21 SEP 08
345
Government House,
Hongkong, 10th. August, 1908.
A
I have the honour to inform Your Excellency
that the local Committee of the China Association, which re-
-presents most of the leading British firms in this Colony, has
had under its confidential consideration the proposed Convention
between His Majesty's Government and the Japanese Government and the Convention concluded between the United States Government
and the Japanese Goverment for the mutual protection of each
country's registered Trade Marks in China and Corea.
2.
It is the opinion of the Committee that by
signing the proposed Convention the British Government would be
conferring on Japanese subjects a far greater measure of
protection that the Japanese Government could afford to British
subjects in the present unsatisfactory state of Japanese law in
relation to Trade Mark Registration. The members of the Com-
-mittee therefore view with concern the idea of concluding the
Convention as it stands, or any Convention on these lines,
until Japanese law has been altered to bring it more into con-
-formity with British law, and they hope that in the meantime no
consent will be given to any rules drawn up by China which would
permit of Japanese pirated Trade Marks acquiring proprietary
rights in China.
3.
In this connection I would remind Your
Excellency of the view expressed by Sir Pelham Warren that the
conclusion of a Convention with Japan for the mutual protection
of Trade Marks in China will not result in preventing the lige
of imitated marks unless the Japanese law is amended in such a
way