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Enclosure 3 in No. 8.
Mr. Alston to Chinese Minister for Foreign Affairs.
Sir,
Peking, November 10, 1913. ON the 16th July last I addressed a memorandum to the Wai-chiao Pu, stating that, on receipt of a report from His Majesty's consul at Kiukiang, I would communi cate again with them on the subject of their request that Kiangsi might be placed on the list of provinces into which Indian opium should not be conveyed.
I am now in receipt of the consul's report, and regret that I do not see my way to consent to place Kiangsi forthwith on the list of provinces into which Indian opium shall not be conveyed, but am ready, in accordance with article 4 of the 1911 agree- ment, to arrange for investigations next spring on the lines of the joint inspections carried out in Shantung, Anhui and Hunan this year.
I avail,
B. ALSTON.
All superior administrative officials, in Peking and outside Peking, are hereby again ordered to obey respectfully all our former orders in reference to the three steps namely, the suppression of cultivation, the suppression of transportation and the suppression of smoking-and to carry them out with the strictest severity. As to the entry of Indian opium into ports, the supervisors of the customs are ordered to examine it strictly in accordance with the treaty, with the view to its total cessation. The fundamental plan lies in the adoption of more stringent preventive measures and the enforcement of clearly-defined laws and orders. Let the Ministry of Home Affairs and the Legislative Board frame and promulgate an order dealing with cases of infringement upon the Opium Suppression Law and the rules regulating the punishment of officials or officers who have been indifferent in suppressing opiumi. Let the Ministry of Education compile some lessons setting forth the evil effects of opium upon mankind and embody them into the educational readers as a warning to the public. The Ministry of Industry and Commerce and the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry shall devise various means to promote the prospects of the people in those districts from which the poppy has been uprooted. Thus the evil will be assailed both materially and fundamentally, and it may disappear root and branch. Let all our officials be careful not to view this order lightly.
No. 9.
Sir,
Sir J. Jordan to Sir Edward Grey-(Received December 22.)
Peking, December 5, 1913.
I HAVE the honour to forward translation of a Presidential Order dated the 27th October dealing with opium prohibition.
The order is of a general nature, and contains nothing to which exception can be taken, and its substance may be summed up in the following extract :—
The fundamental plan lies in the adoption of more stringent preventive measures and the enforcement of clearly defined laws and orders.
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The date of its appearance is seasonable, as November is the most usual month for sowing the poppy in the provinces, and it may be construed as a warning to Chinese officials to carry on the anti-opium campaign with vigour. The warning is by no means unnecessary, and it is noteworthy that the correspondent of Reuter's Pacific Service at Lanchow-fu, the capital of Kansu, has estimated that this year's revenue from opium harvested last summer in this province alone is more than 1,000,000 taels (135,000.),
Prior to the issue of the order, the International Reform Bureau, of which Mr. Thwing, an American citizen, is the secretary, repeatedly urged the creation of an official anti-opium bureau at Peking, and General Chang, the anti-opium delegate who visited London last summer, drew up a set of rules and submitted a statement in which the annual upkeep of such a bureau was put down at 42,638 dollars. The Cabinet have now issued instructions to the Ministry of the Interior for the establish- ment within their Department of an official anti-opium bureau whose duty it will be to take charge of opium prohibition work throughout the whole of China."
No. 10.
Sir J. Jordan to Sir Edward Grey.-(Received December 23.)
Sir,
Peking, December 8, 1913. I HAVE the honour to forward correspondence with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs relative to the placing of Honan on the list of provinces into which Indian opium shall not be conveyed under article 3 of the Opium Agreement of 1911.
The annual production of opium in Honan-even before the initiation of a policy of suppression has never been very large, and in 1907 was estimated at 5,000 piculs, equivalent to between 4,000 and 5,000 chests. Since that date the cultivation had been reported to have been practically suppressed except in the south- west, but the revolution brought along with it a recrudescence in the hill district and borderlands, and along the northern part of the Honan-Anhui frontier; in the rest of the province there appears to have been little or no cultivation of poppy last spring. The present season is as yet too early to pronounce an opinion as to cultivation, but from information recently received at this Legation it seems evident that the importation of native opium has not yet ceased.
I have accordingly declined to place Honan on the probibition list without a joint inspection on the lines of article 4 of the 1911 agreement.
I have, &c.
Enclosure 1 in No. 10.
Wai-chiao Pu to Sir J. Jordan,
J. N. JORDAN.
Enclosure in No. 9.
I have, &c.
J. N. JORDAN.
Presidential Order, dated October 27, 1913.
OPIUM PROHIBITION,
BY order of the President :-
With regard to the ill-effects of opium, orders have been issued and reiterated during the last two years by me, the President, for its suppression by stringent measures. Recently it has been ascertained that of the administrative offices dealing in the affairs of opium suppression, although there are some not altogether devoid of good result achieved, yet there are also those which have done their duty either in a lukewarm and careless manner or diligently at the outset and negligently afterwards. If the evil is not extirpated entirely the curse will spread endlessly.
(Translation) Sir,
Peking, December 3, 1913. THE following telegram has been received from the Tutu and Chief Civil Administrator of Honan:-
"Officers have been repeatedly sent to examine the state of poppy cultiva- tion in Honan province, and they report that it has now been completely extinguished. The importation of native drug from neighbouring provinces has also been prohibited; so the condition of Houan is similar to that of Shansi and the other provinces (on the prohibition list). Please approach the British Minister in Peking and obtain the prohibition of the import into Honan of Indian opium."
The proposal to probibit the entry of Indian opium into Honan province is in accordance with article 3 of the Opium Agreement, and the precedent established in the case of other provinces should be extended, and Honan placed on the list of closed provinces.
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