CO129-512-3 Termination of Chinese arms embargo 2-3-1929 - 19-4-1929 — Page 44

Q.

Wood 22

In any further communication on this subject, please quote

No. 1087/120/10

and address-

not to any person by name,

but to-

66

The Under-Secretary of State,"

Foreign Office,

London, S.W.1.

Immediate.

Oce ftantial

20.

43

FOREIGN OFFICE,

S.W.1.

13th March, 1929.

Sir,

I am directed by Secretary Sir Austen Chamberlain

to enclose herewith, to be laid before the Secretary of

State for the Colonies, a copy of a telegram from His

Majesty's Minister at Peking regarding the termination of

the China Arms Embargo Agreement of 1919.

2.

Sir Austen Chamberlain proposes to instruct

Sir H. Lampson to point out to the Representatives of the

other Powers concerned that inasmuch as the Embargo Agreement

was to continue "until the establishment of a Government

"whose authority is recognised throughout the whole country",

and inasmuch as such a Government has now been established

at Nanking, the continued enforcement of the Agreement would

appear to be illogical; that it is certainly illogical in

the case of His lajesty's Government, who have actually

recognised the Nanking Government; and that if, by the end

of the present month, the Corps Diplomatique are still not

unanimously in favour of abrogation, His Majesty's Government

propose themselves to withdraw from the Agreement. In such

a case the Agreement will no longer be binding in the case

of British subjects, and steps will be taken simultaneously

to repeal the 1919 King's Regulations by means of which the

Embargo is enforced in British Courts in China. Licences

will still be required for the export of arms from this

country to China under the Arms Export Prohibition Order of 191.

3.

The Under Secretary of State,

Colonial Office.