CO129-302 - Public Offices - 1900 — Page 577

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that equal treatment shall be accorded to Japanese and British vessels with regard to the items of export trade. Nor are they able to find a single Article among the other Treaty provisions which either directly or indirectly necessitates equality of export

Tariff,

I should like also to add that the belief of the Imperial Government that the action taken in the present case does not conflict with Treaty obligations can be proved to be correct by reference to what many of the Powers having Commercial Treaties with Japan are now doing.

I take, &c.

(Signed) Viscount AOKI SHIUZO.

This Document is the Property of Her Britannic Majesty's Government.]

JAPAN: TREATY REVISION.

CONFIDENTIAL.

No. 1.

The Marquess of Salisbury to Sir E. Satow.

[January 20.1

SECTION 1.

568 18727

RECO

REG: 14 JUN 00

(No. 9.) Sir,

Foreign Office, January 20, 1900. I HAVE received your despatch No. 192 of the 27th November relative to the duties recently imposed on the exportation of certain kinds of tea from Formosa.

After communication with the Board of Trade on the subject, I have to state that Her Majesty's Government are of opinion that Viscount Aoki's note to you of the 24th November does not meet the point raised in your protest. It appears to them that, under Article VI of the Treaty between Great Britain and Japan, an export duty cannot be levied on tea exported from a Japanese port to a foreign country enjoying Treaty rights in Japan unless the same duty is levied on tea exported from the same pert to all other foreign destinations. It would seem that, at present, tea exported from Formosa to the United States via Kobo escapes the duty to which tea exported from Formosa to the United Kingdon and elsewhere via Amoy or Hong Kong is subject. Her Majesty's Government consider that they have cause to protest against this inequality of treatment. They cannot accept what they understand to be the contention of the Japanese Government, that the tea exported to the United States via Kobo is sent coastwise from Formosa to a Japanese port, and is thence exported to the United States, if, as they understand from your despatch, the tea in question is not even landed at Kobe, but merely transhipped there. Her Majesty's Government are of opinion that such transhipment could not alter the real character of the trade, which is undoubtedly exportation from Formosa to a destination not in Japan, but in a foreign country,

In these circumstances, they consider that they have good ground for sustaining their protest.

I accordingly request you to make a further representation to the Japanese Government in the above sense, unless you are of opinion that the present moment is inopportune for doing so.

[1710 u-1]

I am, &c.

(Signed)

SALISBURY.