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[This Document is the Property of His Britannic Majesty's Government.]
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18595
AFFAIRS OF CHINA.
CONFIDENTIAL.
[18074]
No. 1.
Foreign Office to India Office.
175
RECO
REG 18 JUN 10)
[May 23.]
SECTION 1.
Sir,
Foreign Office, May 23, 1910. I AM directed by Secretary Sir Edward Grey to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 11th instant, inviting attention to two telegrams from the Viceroy of ladia, dated the 29th April and the 2nd May respectively, advance copies of which were sent to this department on the 30th April and the 3rd May, relative to the recent Chinese aggression at Pien-ina on the N'Maikla section of the Burmah China frontier, and recommending that representations should at once be made at Peking on the subject.
I am to state that on receipt of the Viceroy's telegrams, Mr. Max Müller, His Majesty's chargé d'affaires at Peking, was consulted as to the possibility of carrying out the recommendations of the Government of India. Mr. Max Müller was at the same time asked when the report of the investigation made by His Majesty's consul at Tengyueh might be expected.
A reply has been received, copy of which is enclosed herewith for the information of the Secretary of State for India, from which it appears that the Wai-wu Pu have addressed a note to Mr. Max Müller claiming that the l'ien-ma villages are in Chinese territory, and generally upholding the action of the provincial authorities. Mr. Max Müller accordingly suggests that he should refer the Wai-wu Pu to the last sentence of Sir E. Satow's note of the 1st May, 1906, and to the warning contained in his note of the 30th January, 1904, as to the risks of armed collisions, and that he should request them to remind the Yunnan authorities of the instructions sent to them in 1898 that no attempt should be made to exercise Chinese authority to the west of the watershed mentioned in Sir E. Satow's note of the 1st May, 1906.
Sir E. Grey approves generally Mr. Max Müller's suggestion, but he proposes, with the concurrence of Lord Morley, to instruct him to preface his communication to the Chinese Government by stating that His Majesty's Government must await the full report from Mr. Rose before being in a position to reply to their note.
No mention is made in Mr. Max Müller's telegram as to when the consul's report may be expected. A further enquiry will therefore be addressed to him as to this point.
I am,
&c.
F. A. CAMPBELL.
[2751 s-1]
* Mr. Max Muller, No. 99, Telegraphic, May 21, 1910.