CO129-471 - Public Offices - 1921 — Page 631

630

18

because the amount passing across the Chinese border has been quadrupled. Turning east, we find reports of large quantities of opium reaching Yunnan from Burma, and reaching Kansu from the new dominion. The rapid increase in opium smuggling is illustrated by the fact that in 1919 the customs service seized 48,000 odd lbs. of the drug, as opposed to 26,000 lbs. in the previous year. These seizures merely touch the fringes of this enormous traffic.

99. The smuggling of morphia is also becoming serious. In the last decade the quantity of morphia imported by Japan has increased tenfold and almost all of this finds its way across to China. Cocaine presents a further difficulty, as is shown by the fact that the Customs seizures for 1919 were ten times greater than in 1918.

100. The remedy for this state of affairs is difficult to find. There is a strong movement on foot in favour of legalisation. Apart from the opposition to such a course which might be anticipated from public opinion in England, in China and in America, it presents obvious disadvantages from the moral, political and economic points of view. There appears indeed to be no immediate remedy in sight. The only policy which commends itself as reasonable is a frank recognition that the recrudescence of opium in China is a direct result of the present administrative chaos. It may be hoped that that chaos, at least in its present acute form, is only a passing phase. It cannot safely be used as an excuse for the establishment of unsound precedents and hasty legislation. Constant watchfulness and pressure on the Central Government and the provincial authorities, publicity, and the action of the British courts, will assist to some extent in maintaining reasonable security for British interests. The interests of the Chinese and of other nationals, for whom no adequate legislation or restrictive measures are enforced, must await a more established order in China,

FROM

1921

HONG KONG

C

[S187

76

0 21

FOR CIROGLATION :—

Mr.

Jir.

Mr.

Beckett

Mr. Grindle

Sir H. Lambert

Sir H. Road

|Sir Str. Mašlėdon Smith.

Mr. Wood

Mr. Churchill

DATE

9 Nov.

SUBJECT

ваша

Situation in China.

I copy deep. from leking

Yo

54946

Previous Paper

? Put by

Purly

Subsequent Paper

200

56861

()(377300) Wt. 4710/19 Gp. 163

40000 5-21 W&S LL

MINUTES

Do

2 papers. fue also 54976