[This Document is the Property of His Britannic Majesty's Government.]
OPIUM.
CONFIDENTIAL.
[38354]
CO
35950
[October 31.]
SECTION 2.
REOP
Rrof 24 NOV 10)
No. 1.
367
Sir,
Foreign Office to India Office.
Foreign Office, October 31, 1910.
I AM directed by Secretary Sir E. Grey to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 21st instant, and to state that the draft telegram enclosed therein upon the subject of an opium agreement with China has been dispatched to His Majesty's chargé d'affaires at Peking.
From the tenour of the third paragraph of the telegram from the Viceroy of India enclosed in your letter under reply, Sir E. Grey gathers that the Government of ludia consider that the attitude of His Majesty's representative at Peking on the opinm question has not been such as to safeguard adequately the interests of India in this question. I am to point out that in making this criticism the Government of India would appear not to have taken into sufficient account the difficulty of the task imposed upon His Majesty's chargé d'affaires, His Majesty's Government are committed to a policy of sympathetic co-operation with the Chinese in their anti-opiam crusade, and Mr. Max Müller's action in upholding the treaty rights of British merchants has, in Sir E. Grey's opinion, beeu as strong as the definite instructions which he has received from His Majesty's Government, and their expressed determination to assist the Chinese to put an end to the opium habit, would permit.
As Lord Morley is aware, there is a considerable body of opinion in this country altogether opposed to the opium trade, and which advocates the release of China from all treaty engagements and restrictions in the matter.
I ain, &c.
F. A. CAMPBELL.
[2957 hh-2]
.