CO129-486 - Public Offices - 1924 — Page 323

320

gure Fo. 1 in Sustom despatch ño. 8 to Foreign Office of May 26, 1974.

Legation

to

Consul.

British Legation

Liking.

March 15, 1924.

JODY.

sir,

I transmit to you herewith, in original for eventual

return, a letter with enclosures from a Mr. Yeap Seng Koon

of Swatow regarding his nationality.

While it is true that Mr. Yeap Bong Ioon is not entitled

to British registration and protection in China under exist-

ing instructions which are those given on Page 21 of Major's

Compendium, the case appears to be a particularly hard ons

if the facts are as stated in the enclosed correspondence,

namely that Mr. Yeep Song Zoon's father and grand-father

were born at Penang, that he himself was born at Tamsui in

Formosa when his father was employed in the British

Consulate there, and that he has been regularly registered

as a British subject in China in the past. Moreover, apart

from the special procedure in fores as far as we are

concerned in regard to the registration and protection of

British subjects of Chinese origin in China, Mr. Yeap Beng

Koon would appear to have a good claim under British law to

British nationality under Section 1 of the British nation-

ality and Status of Aliens Act of 1914, as amended by Sestion

1 of the Act of 1922, subject to the fact that British

subjects of dual nationality are not entitled to British

protection in the country of their second nationality.

regard China as constituting to some extent an exception to

this latter principle concerning double nationality because

we refuse to subscribe to the Chinese thesis of jus sanguinie

› in perpetuity, though we apply it in China to the extent of

refusing to recognise as British subjects in China the

children