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flagrant breach of the additional article to the Chefoo Agreement, but it was also a direct violation of the Opium Agreement of 1911.
The excuse now put forward is unworthy of a responsible State Department, and His Majesty's Minister requests that the Wai-chiao Pu will move the president to deliver a severe reprimand to the tutu of Anhui for his orders which have misled the li-kin station at Wan Chih into committing a gross breach of treaty.
Peking, January 10, 1913.
(Translation.)
Enclosure 2 in No. 1.
Memorandum communicated to Sir J. Jordan.
THE Wai-chiao Pu, who have had under consideration the memorandum of the 19th December of last year from His Majesty's Minister on the subject of the detention and burning of Indian opium in Anhui province, find themselves quite unable to admit the justice of the allegations made therein, and beg to offer the following remarks in refutation :---
The memorandum observes that "the Wai-chiao Pu insinuate that the question of redress is one between the Chinese Government and its own subjects. They forget or choose to ignore the fact that His Majesty's Government is the other party to the agreement and is justified in exacting proper reparation for its violation." Stringent suppression of opium in China has been going on for several years, and the fact that the import of Indian opium is still allowed is due to respect for the agreement between Great Britain and China, while this destruction in Anhui of seven chests of Indian opium resulted simply from the separation of the goods from the documents, and the province was simply upholding strictly the right, in accordance with the agreement, to regulate." This can hardly be stigmatisel as forgetting" or ignoring," and as there has been no violation of the agreement, there is no occasion to speak of reparation.
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Further, his Excellency's memorandum interprets the circumstances of the cessation of business by the Wuhu opium merchants as proving the imposition of restrictions. This is totally at variance with the information in the possession of the Wai-chiao Pu, who received on the 11th December a telegram from the Anhui tatu quoting a report from the Wuhu Opium Business Office that, inasmuch as their business was a contra- vention of morality, they had unanimously decided voluntarily to enter into a common agreement binding them all to close their business by the end of the 10th moon of the present year (lunar calendar) (8th December, 1912) and adopt some other livelihood in its place, as an example to other ports. They also declared that the opium merchants in the port had always contracted for opium with the native firms in Shanghai, and had never had any direct business dealings with foreign merchants. This declaration was submitted by the police office at the port, for purposes of record, to the tutu, who sent up the information as to the voluntary cessation of opium business at the port.
This universal cessation of tlie merchant's business was, according to their own showing, a genuinely unanimous and spontaneous step, while the making of the agreement, coupled with the request for its registration would seem to stultify the idea that the movement arose out of restrictions imposed by the province. The assertion that the head of the Opium Prohibition Bureau stated that he would arrest everyone purchasing opium is presumably an erroneous rumour and hardly capable of prof. Again, the memorandum atates that "the responsibility for the uniform disregard of the opium agreement now rests with the Central Government, who have by the publication of the Penal Code and by other measures of encouragement, done much to reduce the treaty to a dead letter."
The publication of laws for the suppression of opium is expressly conceded by the agreement, and laws should rightly be of equal effect with treaties; moreover, the laws published by Government have been auxiliary to, not subversive of, the agreement, the real benefit of which to the cause of opium suppression in China is fully appreciated by the Central Government and provinces alike, and by no means ignored, as the Wai-chiao Pu can confidently affirm.
WAI-CHIAO PU.
Peking, January 10, 1913.
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Enclosure 3 in No. 1.
Memorandum communicated to Wai-chiao Pu.
SIR JOHN JORDAN has the honour to acknowledge receipt of the memorandum of the 10th January from the Wai-chiao Pu, relating to the detention and burning of Indian opium in the province of Anhui and to the cessation of business by the Wuhu opium merchants.
Sir John Jordan would observe that the Opium Agreement of 1911 was a perfectly voluntary compact. So favourable were the terms to China that the arrangement made with regard to total extinction and prohibition by provinces was pronounced in the Imperial decree of the 9th May, 1911, to be entirely satisfactory, and the decree concluded with an acknowledgment of the kind assistance of a friendly Power.
This is
the agreement which the present Chinese Government have openly fouted. Sir John Jordan regrets that he is compelled to repeat deliberately that the Central and Provincial Governments are alike responsible for this grave violation of international engagements. He repeats, moreover, that the responsibility for the uniform disregard for the opium agreements now rests with the Central Government. The reason for this statement has been given in the previous memorandum-the publication of the Penal Code and other messures of encouragement.
An instance will illustrate the Minister's meaning. Sir John Jordan requested that the circular instructions issued by the Wai-wu Pu in June 1911 should be reissued under the authority of a presidential order. He was given clearly to understand that this would be done. The circular instructions, as the Wai-chiao Pu will remember, were explanatory of the purport of the Opium Agreement of 1911, and were issued at the time to avoid misunderstanding in the future. They included a statement peculiarly applicable to the condition of affairs in the province of Anhui at the time of the detention and destruction of the seven chests of opium at Anch'ing. The statement reads: "But if in any province cultivation has not yet entirely ceased and there are still a large number of smokers, no forcible repressive measures must be taken in that province in respect of the trade in and movement of foreign or native opium." The presidential order of the 25th December, however, omitted this and other important statements, with the result that opium suppression is now attended with scenes of violence which are unusual in civilised communities.
In their memorandum under acknowledgment the Wai-chiao Pu maintain that the regulate" the trade in province of Anhui was simply upholding strictly the right to " accordance with the agreement. The Wai-chiao Pu have forgotten or have chosen to ignore the meaning of "regulate," so explicitly given in the circular instructions of June 1911, which laid down that "in future the regulation of the trade must be restricted to the issue of smoking certificates,' and thus the cause of opium suppression will benefit without contravening the agreement."
Sir John Jordan feels sure that the Wai-chiao Pu give him credit for more knowledge of China than to expect that he will accept the Auhui tutu's report on the voluntary cessation of the opium business at Wuhu. Voluntary declarations of this kind are obtained and enforced by methods perfectly familiar to every foreign resident in China.
His Majesty's Minister now repeats his demand for the payment of compensation for the opium destroyed, and the publication in the province of Anhui of a proclamation embodying the terms of the circular instructions of June 1911.
Peking, January 17, 1913.
(No. 4.)
Enclosure 4 in No. 1.
Consul-General Fraser to Sir J. Jordan.
Sir,
Shanghai, January 8, 1913. IN confirmation of my telegrams Nos. 163 and 164 of the 23rd and 28th December, 1912, I have the honour to state that the native authorities have completely stopped all sale of Indian opium outside the foreign settlements at this port.
The native dealers in the Chinese parts of Shanghai were first compelled to make a return of their stocks, and were then notified that any opium left over by noon on the 31st December would be confiscated. The latter intimation was made by the magistrate,
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