CO129-395 - Public Offices - 1912 — Page 442

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

OPIUM.

CONFIDENTIAL.

[26141]

No. 1.

Foreign Office to China Association.

[June 25

SECTION 2.

438

C.

Sir,

Foreign Office, June 23, 1912. I AM directed by Secretary Sir FL Grey to acknowledge the receipt of of the 18th instant, calling attention to the violation by the Chinese provincial letter your authorities of the opium agreement of the 8th May, 1911, and suggesting that the Government of India should be requested to suspend the sales of opium in Calcutta and Bombay.

In reply I am to inform you that the Government of India have carefully considered this question in all its bearings and are unable to entertain the above suggestion. They point out that the sales are held in accordance with public announcements made at the beginning of the year, and that the Government have undertaken in the published conditions of sale to make no change in the number of chests to be sold in each month or in the terms of sale without giving three months' notice of their intention. They add that, with the exception of one Bengal sale on the 24th September, the sales in 1912 of Malwa and Bengal opium for the China market will be completed within three months from now.

I am to inform you at the same time that His Majesty's Minister at Peking has been instructed to make strong representations to the Chinese Government with a view to securing the enforcement in the provinces of their treaty obligations, but the inability of the Central Government, referred to in the telegram from your Shanghai branch, to control the provinces which are offending in the matter creates a most difficult situation.

I am, &c.

W. LANGLEY.

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