[This Document is the Property of His Britannic Majesty's Government.]
[B]
CHINA RAILWAYS.
CONFIDENTIAL.
[42419]
No. 1.
272
39899
O DECOS
[November 24]
SECTION 1.
Sir Edward Grey to M. Cambon.
Your Excellency,
Foreign Office, November 24, 1909. WITH reference to my note of the 1st instant, enclosing for your Excellency's consideration a memorandum containing a fresh proposal for the redistribution of the engineering sections on the Hankow-Szechuan line, I have the honour to state that on the 12th instant the United States Ambassador in London informed me that the settlement proposed by Mr. Straight, the agent of the American group in China, viz., that an American engineer should be appointed for the Hsiang-Yang-Kuangshui section of 200 kilom., to co-operate with and be subject to the general direction of the German chief engineer, and that by private arrangement the Szechuan line is to be divided as follows-
1st section of 500 kilom., French chief engineer;
American chief engineer; and British chief engineer;
2nd 3rd
รา
600 500
""
27
was acceptable to the German Government, on condition that the American engineer would not interfere with the judgment of the German chief engineer in respect of the purchase of materials. Mr. Whitelaw Reid expressed the hope that as a settlement on the above lines was understood to be in harmony with the proposals of His Majesty's Government, the latter would invite the British group to sign the agreement.
A reply has been returned to this communication to the effect than an arrangement of the kind described is in fact agreeable to His Majesty's Government.
The German Ambassador has been informed of the above, and in stating the willingness of His Majesty's Government to adhere to the Straight proposals, I at the same time expressed my readiness to send instructions to His Majesty's Minister at Peking to concert with his colleagues as to obtaining the extension from the Chinese Government, and I enquired whether the German representative would receive similar instructions.
[2486 aa--
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I have, &c.
E. GREY.
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