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have, Chinese excepted, the exclusive right of navigation. The ambiguous wording, however, of article 1 in Part I and the text of various other articles seem to leave no room for doubt that the Russian authorities have, at least for the time being, succeeded to a very large extent in securing recognition of the privileged position to which they laid claim both in regard to this and the other points already mentioned. For example, it is to be observed :-
1. Vessels (vide article S, Part 1) are only required to produce their papers for inspection to officers of the Imperial Maritime Customs and inland barrier officials acting on behalf of this institution. The native authorities have no right of interference on their own behalf whatever.
2. All local dues (vide article 1, Part II) are to be levied before loading or after discharge of cargo. The effect of this is to exclude all native levies en route once the goods are shipped on board, contrary to the provisions contained in the regulations of the 26th June, 1909.
3. Imports from Russia (vide article 4, Part II), when destined for the Chinese frontier zones, are exempt from duty,
4. Native goods exported to the Russian frontier zones are free of duty. The privileges claimed for the principal marts of Iarbarovsk and Blagovestchensk, to which I had the honour to refer in my despatch No. 9 of the 50th April last, are thus established. It has, however, to be mentioned that the Imperial Maritime Customs officials have the right to require from the Russian Customs authorities certificates in proof that goods have actually been consumed in the places for which they were declared; while another point of no little interest is that, as stated in my despatch No. 8 of the 13th April last, it was estimated that fully 70 per cent. of the export duties leviable at Harbin on cargo shipped by river would have been obtained from goods, chiefly grain, bound for Harbarovsk and Blagovestchensk.
5. Native goods, excluding various grains and beans and cargo destined for the Russian frontier zones, pay (vide article 5, Part II) one full treaty export duty only. This involves the abolition of the coast trade duty. Buckwheat, "kaoliang" (large millet), "hsiao mitzu" (small millet), wheat, beans, &c., pay only two-thirds duty. The effect of this stipulation is to remove the anomaly mentioned in my despatch No. 12 of the 14th May last, and beans and grain brought down-river from Petuna or up-river from Sansing and the Hulan district to Harbin for export by rail to Vladivostock will pay the same Imperial Maritime Customs duty as that charged when they are conveyed from the place of origin to Harbin by rail or cart.
6. Tonnage docs are abolished under article 2, Part II, and river dues are substituted. The latter form of taxation conforms, I gather, more with Russian practice, and will be more equitable in its incidence. The charges, I understand, will be levied at so much per passenger, per pood of goods, and per head of live-stock, according to the distance travelled. The table of river dues has not yet been prepared, and tonnage dues will continue to be collected during the present navigation
season.
7. The arrangement as to duty-free goods is, I am confidentially informed, as follows: It was agreed that the duty-free list of the 1861 treaty should he introduced on the Sungari; but that, inasmuch as no definite agreement had yet been reached as to its application to goods carried on the Chinese Eastern Railway, no specific mention of its adaptation to the Sungari traffic should be made in the new regulations. I had the honour to refer to this matter in my despatch No. 9 of the 30th April last.
The above are, I think, the main points; but there are a few other particulars to which it may be useful to invite attention.
Art. 14 in Part I, though it contains certain provisos as to payment under protest, and reference under given circumstances to the Russian consul-general, apparently gives to the Imperial Maritime Customs the right of direct infliction of fines for infraction of Customs rules and regulations.
Art. 6 in Part I, and other articles, provide that steamers' manifests may be signed by the captain or responsible agent. The reason for the inclusion of the latter is that in many instances the captain has no general authority on board, and is merely employed for navigation purposes. I am, in fact, reliably informed that in some cases the steamers are actually navigated by the owners, who thoroughly understand the intricacies of the rivers, but have no master's certificates, and are therefore compelled to carry certificated captains in order to comply with the Russian regulations for the navigation of the Amur.
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Paragraph 1, under "Harbin Customs Provisional Regulations," omits the demand for the deposit, on entering port, of the ship's papers with the Imperial Maritime Customs. The same omission is noticeable in the Sansing and Lahasusu regulations, the reason, I understand, being that no ship's papers, in the usual sense of the term, are carried.
In reviewing the whole position, I am in no small degree handicapped by the fact that I have not yet had time to give a close study to local trade statistics, and that the opportunity has not yet offered of making a journey along the Sungari and Amur rivers, with the object of obtaining first-hand information, and of judging for oneself as to the condition of things in general; but, as far as I can gauge matters at present, there can, I think, be little doubt that the Russian authorities have, as previously inferred, succeeded to a very large extent in maintaining the position adopted by them in regard to all the chief points at issue.
Though, theoretically, the privilege of navigating the Sungari may perhaps be reserved for the subjects of other foreign Powers, the real intention of the present regulations undoubtedly seems to be to limit this right to Russian subjects only. Notwithstanding that the place-to-place local traffic is not great, and that no attempt has been made by the Chinese authorities to collect li-kin en route, the definite fact that the coast-trade duty is abolished, that the necessity for inland-water certificates is withdrawn, that the native officials have no right of interference with Russian vessels on their own behalf whatever, and that all native charges on goods must be imposed before loading or after discharge, makes it sufficiently clear that Russia has--at least for the time being-sustained her argument that, as far as she is concerned, all places on the Sungari are, under the 1858 and 1881 treaties, open to navigation and trade, This is a privilege which the subjects of other Powers obviously cannot claim as an ordinary treaty right, and the changes in the new regulations to which I have just referred would therefore appear to acquire peculiar significance. There are, however, other considerations which make it difficult to see how foreign steam-ship owners other than Russian could, under existing political and commercial conditions, make the navigation of the Sungari a profitable enterprise except with Russian toleration and support. The Amur is a frontier river, and the balk of the Sungari trade is a direct trade with places situated in Siberia; the backbone of the export trade is grain for Harbarovsk and Blagovestebensk, and of the import, salt fish from Nikolaievsk. Large numbers of the steamers and barges employed in navigation are, I understand, owned by mill-owners and grain merchants, and even the Chinese Eastern Railway Company cannot itself find work for its fleet of steamers and barges which was acquired to transport the material used in constructing the railway. The majority of its steamers are laid up, and most of its barges, if not out of use, are leased to private parties. The only part of the trade in which foreign ship-owners other than Russian could hope to share is that between Sansing and Harbin and Harbin and Petuna, for the trade with places below Sansing and with Lahasusu is infinitesimal. To do this and be able to call at inland places-- Petuna itself is an inland place--would necessitate a set of regulations more in accord with those of last year than those by which they have now been superseded, unless it were agreed that other foreigners should be admitted to this share of the trade on the same footing as Russian subjects; but even in that case the existing commercial conditions would not, as previously stated, make an independent enterprise of the sort profitable.
Turning to the question of duties, it is easily apparent that the Russian authorities have gained considerably by the arrangements made on this head. Russian exports to the Chinese frontier zones are duty-free, likewise exports from China to the Russian frontier zones; while the dues on grains and beans conveyed by river to Harbin for export by rail are reduced to two-thirds of the tarif duty. Another feature of the agreement concluded on this matter is that the Chinese Government retains all the river duties collected last year; while those levied this season in excess of the rates established by the new regulations are-vide Customs notification, No. 20, enclosed *— to be refunded.
Finally, it may be observed that, though the spirit of the present regulations clearly conflicts with that of the Aigun regulations introduced last year, copy of which was enclosed in my despatch No. 4, it seems unlikely that any question will be raised in regard thereto, either by the Chinese or Russian authorities. The revision of the 1858 and 1881 treaties is now pending, and it is improbable that either party * Not printed.
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