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.PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

Reference :-

C.O.882/11

ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH——NOT TO

| PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

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The Committee has no power, of course, either to modify or interpret the Convention.

As you know, I think there is no objection on merits to an arrangement which would treat the Straits Settlements, Malaya, Sarawak, and North Borneo as a unit *for the purposes of the import and manufacture of prepared opium, and the Tuan Muda's letter to me makes out a stronger case than the earlier despatches indicated. The question raised by Paskin's letter is whether we can get it approved without waiting for the report of the Far Eastern Commission. The difficulty, as you know, is that the provisions of The Hague Convention and the Geneva Agreement are against it, unless we can consider that the transmission of prepared opium from the Straits Settlements to Sarawak or to North Borneo is not an export. Your legal advisers, I understand, take the view that, especially having regard to the special status of Sarawak and North Borneo, it would be difficult to maintain this. I suggest, how- ever, that it would be worth while asking them, in conjunction with the Foreign Office legal advisers, to reconsider the meaning of Article 7 of The Hague Convention. Does that Article in fact require that, for the purposes of its provisions, a contracting party must treat each of its colonies, possessions, protectorates, &c., as distinct and separate units? The wording of the Article is vague and the point does not seem to me at all clear. If the legal advisers were to take the view that import means import from a country not under the control of the contracting party, and export means export to a country not under the control of the contracting party, then perhaps we should have got over most of the difficulty, and the special status of Sarawak and North Borneo might be ignored and they might be treated as British territory for this purpose. Of course, in view of the fact that Sarawak and North Borneo were not included in the declaration made by the British Government at the time of ratifying the Geneva Agreement of 1925, it would be necessary, no doubt, to make some communication to the other contracting parties, which would be rather a nuisance but could not be helped.

If, however, the legal advisers do not consider this interpretation possible, then the only thing is to alter the Convention, and pending the alteration I do not see how it could be argued that you would be entitled to violate the Convention as ap emergency measure as suggested in the sixth paragraph of Paskin's letter. It might be possible to secure by means of correspondence the agreement of the other con- tracting parties who are concerned in the opium smoking question to the construction we want to place upon it. If not, the matter would have to be taken up next year at the Opium Smoking Conference which is due to be held when the Far Eastern Com- mission of Inquiry has made its report.

If you would like to have a meeting of the Interdepartmental Committee to con- sider the matter, with the assistance of the legal advisers, I will arrange to convene it. Meanwhile, I am not answering the Tuan Muda's letter.

C. 73017/1/30 [No. 16].

No. 260.

Yours, &c.,

MALCOLM DELEVINGNE.

INTERDEPARTMENTAL OPIUM COMMITTEE. MINUTES OF THe Ninth Meeting, HELD AT THE HOME OFFICE ON WEDNESDAY, 12th March, 1930, at 3.30 p.M. (Extract.)

Present:

Sir Malcolm Delevingne (Home Office), Chairman.

MR. C. W. ORDE (Foreign Office).

SIR GILBERT Grindle

MR. H. W. Malkin

MR. J. J. PASKIN

MR. J. M. MARTIN

(Colonial Office).

MR. M. D. PERRINS (Home Office), Secretary.

THE Committee considered the question whether the supply of prepared opium.

by the Straits Settlements Monopoly to Sarawak and British North Borneo was per-

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missible having regard to the provisions of Article 7 of The Hague Convention and Article 6 (1) of the Geneva Opium Agreement.

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(a) Article 7 of The Hague Convention. It was agreed that the declaration made by the British Delegation recorded in the official minutes of the fourteenth meeting of The Hague Conference (see paragraph 9 of the Foreign Office memorandum attached) covered the proposed supply to Sarawak and, if it was desired to extend the practice, to the supply of prepared opium from Singapore to British North Borneo.

The question whether Sarawak and North Borneo could be considered as parts of the British Empire within the meaning of that term as used in the reservation was discussed, and it was agreed that they could be so considered. SIR GILBERT Grindle

British Empire reminded the Committee that in other Conventions the termi included British Protected Territories. MR. MALKIN pointed out that the Foreign Office letter to the Secretary-General of the League of 30th July, 1925, in regard to Great Britain's signature of the Geneva Opium Agreement, showed conclusively that His Majesty's Government considered that Brunei (which is a native State in Borneo under British protection) should be regarded as being for this purpose within His Majesty's dominions. The Committee considered, therefore, that no action was necessary vis-à-vis the Powers signatory to The Hague Convention, and SIR MALCOLM DELEVINGNE said that he was quite prepared to defend the case on these lines at Geneva if called upon to do so.

(b) Article 6 (1) of the Geneva Agreement. It was agreed that it would be impossible to claim that the proposed supply to Sarawak was in accordance with this Article which quite explicity prohibits the export of prepared opium from any posses- sion or territory. The declaration made by the British Government in regard to the signature of the Geneva Agreement did not cover the proposed supply as it referred only to the existing arrangements for the supply of prepared opium by the Straits Settlements Monopoly. As the arrangement therefore would involve a modification of the Agreement it would be necessary to obtain the consent of the other Parties to the Agreement, i.e., France, Japan, Holland, Portugal, and Siam. (The Committee considered that it would not be necessary to apply formally to the Indian Government, which is also a party, for its assent, but that it would be sufficient to inform the India Office of the contents of the note to be addressed to the other Powers.)

The Committee decided to recommend that the matter should be put to the other Governments as an extension of the present arrangement within the limits of the original British Declaration at The Hague Conference, that Sarawak and North Borneo were within the sphere of the Governor of the Straits Settlements in his capacity as British Agent for Borneo, and that the advantage of the arrangement in regard to the control of the opium traffic should be pointed out.

It was decided that a copy of the communication made to the other Powers should not be sent to the League of Nations until general consent had been obtained, when the exchange of notes would be registered with the League in the usual way.

SIR MALCOLM DELEVINGNE assumed, and SIR GILBERT GRINDLE agreed, that once the arrangement was agreed to by the other Powers, Sarawak would take all its supplies from the Straits Settlements Monopoly and would cease to manufacture itself.

SIR GILBERT GRINDLE said that, in his opinion, if, owing to a strike or other crisis, it might become a matter of urgency for Sarawak or North Borneo to obtain prepared opium from outside, the Government concerned would be justified in so doing, as a matter of necessity even if the crisis should arise before the proposed arrangement had been agreed to by the other Powers. Neither SIR MALCOLM DELEVINGNE nor MR. MALKIN could agree that as a general principle a crisis of such a character made it permissible to depart from the provisions of an international agreement, and it was agreed that if such a case arose it would have to be considered and decided on its merits.

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