CO129-482 - Public Offices - 1923 — Page 82

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Little weight

in connection with that of the amount of oplure to be allowed for re-export, discussed in paragraph 5 below. need presumably be attached to the Portuguese contention that it is necessary to provide for a floating population of six` hundred thousand, If this were really the case, then the population of Maçao would be almost as great as that of Hongkong, and a very much larger supply of opium could legitimately be claimed, But the readiness of the Portuguese Goverment eventually to reduce the ir imports to sixty chests appears to indicate that this is an argument in which they have little

faith themselves.

4.

The Portuguese note makes no mention of the third

of His Majesty's Government's proposals "that Macao be under

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no obligation to take a minimum quantity of opium" but this

is a condition which they would presumably be ready to accept.

5. His Majesty's Government proposed that the importation

of opium for purposes of re-exportation should be entirely

abandoned.

Secher Pereira suggests that a maximum of one

hundred and twenty chests should be allowed for re-export, to be reduced by ten chests annually till the figure of thirty chests

this reduction again would require nine

per annum be reached;

years to be complete. In view of the large amount of illicit

traffic in the Far East whion is known to exist, the Secretary

of State considers that this deland of the Portuguese Government

should not be granted, and that no opium should be allowed for

re-export. Indeed, it does not appear that there is now any

country with which Macao would be likely to conduct a legitimate

trade in opium. Facilities for re-export would therefore be

used,/