CO129-457 - Public Offices - 1919 — Page 653

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

OPIUM.

со

70845

642

[December 2.]

SECTION 1,

2/1

CONFIDENTIAL.

[154941]

Sir,

No. 12 DEC 19

ES

Foreign Office to India Office.

Foreign Office, December 2, 1919. I AM directed by Earl Curzon of Kedleston to acknowledge receipt of your letter of the 24th ultimo, and to inform you in reply that His Majesty's representatives at Paris and Tokyo have been instructed to propose to the French and Japanese Govern- ments the adoption of a fixed rate of 4,000 rupees per chest for the sale of opium under the contemplated agreements.

With regard to the proposal that the Government of Portugal should now be invited to enter in an agreement on similar lines, I am to state that Lord Curzon is quite prepared to initiate negotiations to that end. At the same time I am to suggest that the allowance of 500 chests a year laid down in 1913 is somewhat excessive, and that the present occasion might offer a favourable opportunity for proposing a reduction. In 1913, when the existing arrangements with regard to Macao were made, the local requirements of Hong Kong, with a Chinese population of 450,000 as compared with a total population for Macao of 90,000, were fixed at 540 chests a year. It seems therefore safe to assume that the amount earmarked for local consumption at Macao, namely, 260 chests, is unduly high. The same may be fairly assumed of the remaining 240 chests that are available for export.

The 1913 agreement with Portugal is terminable at any time on either Government giving twelve months' notice. Further, it expressly states that if after periodis of five years the number of chests agreed upon for local consumption at or export from Macao should respectively prove to be excessive, the Portuguese Government will consider the desirability of revising the amount in question.

Accordingly, before instructing His Majesty's Minister at Lisbon to approach the Portuguese Government in the matter, Lord Curzon would be glad to learn Mr. Secretary Montagu's views as to the desirability of suggesting simultaneously a reduction of the present annual limit of 500 chests.

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I am, &c.

J. A. C. TILLEY,