CO537-3707 — Page 113

must include military as well as civilian control..

It is to be noted that a Chinese version of the Convention

was signed, but it is presumed that the equivalent Chinese

expression bears the same meaning as the English.

Shiv

If Kowloon had been a great city with a large and

varied population subject to different types of local

administration, it might have been possible to construe

the words in the provision as retaining for China some

limited form of jurisdiction. They cannot, it is thought

be so construed in the case of a very small city with a very

small population such as Kowloon City, which, at the time

of the Convention was wholly under Chinese administration.

It is accordingly considered that the Convention

provided that complete. Chinese jurisdiction within

Kowloon City should remain vested in the Chinese authorities,

*

subject, of course, to military requirements.

さ

In May 1899 the Chinese officials were driven out and

the City of Kowloon was incorporated in the, leased territory

virtually for all purposes, Chinese control thereafter

disappearing. It is not thought that it could be validly

contended on behalf of Great Britain, that, by virtue of

the doctrine of abandonment or any similar doctrine, the

Chinese Government had lost any rights of jurisdiction

which they possessed through not being able to reassert

jurisdiction..in Kowloon City since 1899. Although for a

prolonged period after 1900 until 1933 the Chinese Government

did not press any claim to exercise jurisdiction in. Kowloon

City, it is not thought that it could be said that China

acquiesced for, a sufficient period to lose any rights she

possessed. The expulsion of Chinese officials was never

in any sense formally accepted by the Chinese as justifiable

or as marking any permanent change in the status of the

City, and it is felt that mere inaction on the part of

China during the period to 1933 cannot be interpreted as

such an abandonment of her claim to jurisdiction as would

prevent her reasserting it now. It follows that it is

not thought necessary for China to assert any overriding

/claim