CO129-467 - Governor Sir Stubbs & Acting Governor Claud Severn - 1921 [1-5] — Page 334

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26110/21

Government House,

Hongkong.

1st April, 1921.

333

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Sir,

I have the honour to acknowledge the receipt

of Lord Milner's despatch No. 450 dated 24th December,

1920, and to state that I concur generally in the

views expressed by Mr. Severn in his despatches No.

308 of 25th September, 1919 and confidential of the

same date with regard to the opium question.

2. Some of the points now raised by the Anti-

Opium Association show them to be singularly ill-

informed on matters of common knowledge. It may perhaps

be well for me to deal specifically with such of the

observations quoted in the Foreign Office letter of 3rd

December, 1920, as directly concern this Government:- (2) The New Territory which is apparently what the

Association means by "h-owloon" is only "a part of

China" in a geographical sense: but in any case no raw

opium whatever goes there from Hongkong.

(4) The opium farm was abolished in 1914 in Hongkong,

its place being taken by a Government monopoly.

(5) The control of morphine, etc. is probably as

strict in Hongkong as anywhere in the world.

(6) "Opium divans" were made illegal in 1909; the

number of opium shops is as low as possible, and the

retail trade in opium is most strictly controlled.

(7) The penalties for illegal possession of "kindred

drugs" are exceptionally heavy in Hongkong.

i

HRIGHT HONOURABLE,

WINSTON CHURCHILL, M.P.

& C+

&C.,

&C.

3.