CO129-343 - Public Offices & Foreign Office - 1907 — Page 23

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Consul presumably he will act in the same man er, and

I do not see how his action will be affected by any

action of the Hongkong overnment save that his hands

will not be strengthened by a request for assistance

emanating therefrom.

There remains the case of Chinese and foreigners

who have no Consular officer to whom they can appeal.

It appears to me that Article 23 of the Treaty was

inserted for the protection of the trade of Hongkong,

and that debtors should not be able to abscond with

impunity to Chinese territory to its detriment.

latter part of the Artide is directed against them,

mention is made of the creditor or his nationality;

and the trade of Hongkong will certainly suffer if

Chinese resident or trading in Hongkong are to be robbed

by their unscrupulous countrymen resident in China.

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When therefore the Hongkong Coverment ask the assist-

ance of the Consul in such cases he ought to act under

the Treaty. This applies to all foreigners whether

they have a Consul or not, but naturally the Trit`sh

Consul will not act in theinterests of say a herman,

unless the German Consul cooperates with him, or at all

events does not act independently.

So much for the theory of the matter, in practice

as Mr. Carnegie has pointed out the Consul has to exert

pressure for the recovery of debts by discursion and

argument and his intervention is not likely to be

equally efficacious in all cases. His discretion must

therefore be left unfettered.

Sir Francis Piggott seeks to establish a system

which will secure the execution of the judgments of

the Hongkong Court in China and calls in aid the latter

part of Article 23 of the Tientsin Treaty. It does not

appear to me that this Article in any way contemplates

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