This Document is the Property of His Britannic Majesty's Government, and should be
returned to the Foreign Office if not required for official use.]
22
From CHINA.
Decode.
Sir M. Lampson (Peking).
9th December, 1929.
D.
4.25 p.m., 9th December, 1929.
R.
No. 1012.
1.15 p.m., 9th December, 1929.
(R).
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Addressed to Shanghai No. 366.
My telegram No. 343.
I have now received revised draft of proposed Hongkong-China Trade and Customs Agreement in which Article 5 is modified so as to restrict inland water privileges of Hongkong stoamers to provinces of Kwangtung and Kuangsi and a new Article
No. 10 - is
added providing for the same duty treatment of Hongkong factory products as that accorded to similar Chinese products.
Governor of Hongkong informs me that agreement as amended is acceptable to Hongkong General Chamber of Commerce, Hongkong branch of China Association and representatives of Chinese merchants.
Assuming that a copy of revision of Agreement is in your hends or that members of British Chamber of Commerce have received a copy from their Hongkong offices, I shall be glad if you will discuss agreement with Committee of Chamber and let me have their opinion together with your own, more particularly from point of visw of reaction which an insistence on terms of Article 5 by Hongkong and its almost certain refusal by China may have on British shipping interests in other parts of
China