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it might have been possible to construe the words in the

provision as retaining for China some limited form of jurisdiction.

They cannot, we think, be so construed in the case of a very small

city with a very small population such as Kowlon City, which,

at the time of the Convention, was wholly under Chinese administration.

We accordingly are of opinion that the Convention provided

that complete Chinese jurisdiction within Kowloon City should remain

vested in the Chinese authorities, subject, of course, to military

requirements.

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.

We do not think 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, we do not think

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 we feel that mere inaction on the part of China during the period of 1933 cannot be interpreted as such an abandonment of her claim to.jurisdiction as would prevent her reasserting it now.

It follows that we do not think it is necessary for China to assert

any overriding claim to sovereignty based upon her title as lessor of

the territory in question; since in our view the terms of the

Convention are appropriate to reserve for her the jurisdiction in

Kowloon City she claims.

If this view is right, the only grand upon which Great Britain

may validly refuse to allow the Chinese authorities to resume

their pre-Convention jurisdiction in Kowloon City would be that

/military

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