NQ SIFCRET (2).
Copies to
Tokyo.
.-in-C.
Copy t
ady
*8 MAR 1928
Sir,
1928 OFFICE
527982
40
GOVERNMENT HOUSE,
HONGKONG 16th January, 1928.
کیسی
38973/18
With reference to the late Sir Henry May's confidential despatch of 10th June, 1918, on the subject
of Japanese-owned craft basing deep sea fishing
organisations on the Colony, I have the honour to forward
for your information recent developments of this question.
The point on which the 1918 application
2.
turned was the expediency of permitting Japanese craft to
fish in the territorial waters of the Colony to the
possible embarrassment of the local fishing industry; but
the permits originally granted were later not renewed, as a consequence of revelations concerning the smuggling of opium. Throughout there was an undercurrent of suspicion
in the minds both of the Colonial Government and of the
Naval Authorities that these activities of the Japanese fishing fleet might prove dangerous in the event of possible future hostilities.
3.
In 1926 the question arose again in an
application to base a high-seas motor trawling business
on Hong Kong, by Messrs. Hayashi and Company of Nagasaki,
THE RIGHT HONOURABLE
LIEUTENANT COLONEL L.C .M.S. AMERY, M.P.,
&c.,
&c.,
&c.
forwarded