91
1.0.5393/10
10/252 3/10
$383/10
incaped murderes from
this tenitores.
ang hid
to the latter and not to residents in the New Territories.
He also asks (a) whether certain Chinese gentlemen may avail themselves of the provisions of the new law to re- nounce Chinese nationality and (b) what action, if any,
he is to take with regard to the issue of certificates te
the other classes of Anglo-Chinese.
212.(1)Nationality of persons resident in the New
Territories. Sir F.H. May has not stated the position
quite accurately. The correspondence ending with the
Secretary of State's confidential despatch of the 25th of
February, set forth fully the view taken by the Foreign
Office and the Colonial Office on the status of these
persons. The Foreign Office in their letter of the 25th
January pointed out that the Law Officers' opinion as
to the British nationality of the residents in the New
Territories had not been communicated to the Chinese
Government and would not (probably) have been accepted by
that Government. In the letter of 21st webruary the
Foreign Office went further and said that Liang To within
the limits of the Chinese Empire must be deemed to be a
Chinese who repered avender him to N Kong Chinese subject. But in the Colonial Office letter of
the 18th of October, in which the Foreign Office expressed
706/10
Zebruary
A
concurrence it was stated that the question of national
status should be allowed to drop in the manner least pre-
judicial to any contention which His Majesty's Government
may wish to uphold in the future. In other words no final
ruling has been given as yet The question was complicated
by the fact that Hong Kong pressed for Liang To's extra-
dition instead of demanding, through the Consul General,
that he should be handed over to the Consular Court. The
Viceroy might possibly have refused this concession on the
same ground as he refused extradition. But in any case
there is a difference which
Sir