CO129-505-6 Chinese telegraph office at Hong Kong- transfer to Cantonese control 8-7-1927 - 29-12-1927 — Page 68

In any further communication on this subject, please quote

No. F 7691/30/10

and address-

not to any person by name,

but to-

The Under-Secretary of State,''

Foreign Office,

2013

Copy Gen. Luf

28 Oct 24

London, S. W.1.

Sir,

RECEIVED

1:5 OCT 1927

COL. OFFICE

3019566

20

FOREIGN OFFICE,

S.W.1.

13th October, 1927.

I am directed by Secretary Sir Austen Chamberlain to refer to your letter No.30195/27 of the 10th September

transmitting copy of a telegram from the Governor of Hongkong

on the subject of the Chinese Telegraph Office in Hongkong.

I am to transmit, to be laid before Mr. Secretary Amery, the

accompanying copy of a letter from Sir J.Denison Pender

addressed to Mr. Mounsey from which it appears that the

Eastern Extension and Great Northern Telegraph Companies are

not prepared to take over the working of the Hongkong Office

unless an arrangement is first come to between His Majesty's

Government and the Chinese Telegraph Administration.

A copy

of Sir J.Pender's letter is being forwarded to His Majesty's

Minister at Peking who will be asked to report whether he

considers that it would now be feasible to come to any

arrangement on the lines suggested.

2.

With regard to the latter part of the telegram

enclosed in your letter under reply the Governor's proposal

to close down the Chinese Telegraph Office appears to be open

to the objection that was urged by the late Sir John Jordan

against a similar proposal, in 1911, namely, that it would be

nothing more than a unilateral abrogation of existing engagements

whose operations extend beyond the limits of British territory

and would certainly lead to measures of reprisals against the

Company by the Chinese Government. Apart from the inconvenience

that might result from restricting communications between

The Under-Secretary of State,

Colonial Office.

Hongkong