(This Document is the Property of His Britannia Majesty Government.]
AFFAIRS OF CHINA.
CONFIDENTIAL.
[24518]
No. 1.
185
[June 30.]
SECTION 1.
India Office to Foreign Office.(Received June 30.)
THE Under-Secretary of State for India presents his compliments to the Under- Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, and, by direction of Viscount Morley, forwards herewith, for the information of the Secretary of State, and with reference to the letter from the Foreign Office of the 30th April, copy of a Secret despatch to the Government of India, dated the 25th June, 1909, regarding the policy towards Bhutan.
India Office, June 29, 1909.
Inclosure in No. 1.
(Secret.) My Lord,
Viscount Morley to Government of India.
India Office, June 25, 1909. HIS Majesty's Government, after careful consideration, have approved the proposal in your Secret despatch in the Foreign Department, dated the 1st October, 1908, that negotiations should be opened with the Bhutan Durbar for a treaty, by which the external relations of that State should be placed under British control. But, as your Excellency will observe from the enclosed copy of correspondence, it has been decided that, should the Maharaja prove willing to enter into arrangements of the kind, the terms of the agreement to be proposed to him should take the form of a revision and expansion of article 8 of the existing treaty of 1865. The exact wording of the revised article I would leave to the discretion of your Excellency's Government, but its substance should be to the following effect :---
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The British Government undertakes to exercise no interference in the internal administration of Bhutan. On its part the Bhutanese Government agrees to be guided by the advice of the British Government in regard to its external relations. In the event of disputes or causes of complaint against the Rajas of Sikkim and Cooch Behar, such matters will be referred for arbitration to the British Government, which will settle them in such manner as justice may require, and insist upon the observance of its decision by the rajahs named."
2. These terms, while involving less of a departure from the existing relations between the Government of India and Bhutan than those of the draft treaty proposed by your Excellency, will secure to His Majesty's Government the necessary status for intervention in the event of Chinese aggression.
3. The question of keeping the treaty secret, which is discussed in the sixth paragraph of the letter to the Foreign Office of the 22nd April, has since then been further considered. His Majesty's Government have arrived at the conclusion that our position towards China will be weakened if the real nature of our relations with Bhutan is concealed. The time and manner of making the treaty known will be determined after it has been signed. Meanwhile the Bhutan Durbar should understand that the negotiatious and their result are not to be disclosed in any quarter.
4. The conditions that should govern the negotiations are sufficiently explained in paragraphs 8 and 9 of the letter to the Foreign Office of the 22nd April, 1909, and need not be recapitulated here.
5. As regards the question of industrial enterprise in the portions of Bhutan adjoining British territory, Mr. Bell should be authorised to assure the Maharaja of our willingness to assist nim in developing the resources of his country, and to avoid, as far as possible, the discussion of details in a form likely to delay or prejudice an agreement in respect of the foreign relations of the State.
I have, &c.
MORLEY OF BLACKBURN.
*To Foreign Office, April 22; telegram to His Majesty's Minister, Feking, April 26; telegram from ditto, April 27; and from Foreign Office, April 30, 1909 (already printed).
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