C
Sr.
S.S. "Fushimi Maru,"
At Sea,
February 17th, 1931.
81
22a om
72770
sir,
I have the honour to acknowledge the receipt
at Singapore on February 9th of your despatch No.
1005 of December 1st, 1930 (F 6260/738/10) on the
subject of the proposed establishment of a Chinese
Consulate at Kuala Lumpur, in which you call for my
views on the point raised in the concluding sentence
of the letter from the Colonial office of October
30th, namely that the recognition by the Chinese
Government of the principle that "a State may not
afford diplomatic protection to one of its nationals
against a State whose nationality such person also
possesses" should be strongly pressed in connection
with the settlement of the question of the protection
of Anglo-Chinese in China.
2. The present position in regard to this
vexed question of the protection by His Majesty's
Consuls in China of British Subjects of Chinese
descent is that after an interdepartmental correspon-
dence lasting for nearly ten years His Majesty's
Government decided quite recently that we should seek
a settlement along the lines of admitting the applica-
bility to these people of the Chinese nationality law
(and therefore their double nationality) provided we
could secure assurances that denationalisation certi-
ficates would not be unreasonably withheld and make
The Right Honourable
Arthur Henderson, H.P.,
arrangements
etc.,
eto..
etc.,
FOREIGN OFFICE.