CO129-543-16 China- protection for Anglo-Chinese 13-2-1933 - 13-3-1934 — Page 82

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whole matter at his finger ends and recalled the

correspondence of 1930. As regards the issue of

denationalisation certificates, he assured me that there

would be no difficulty;

if all was in order and the

requirements of the Law were met, the obtaining of a

certificate was merely a routine matter. But, as

regards the proposed exemption for transient visitors,

it was impossible to make any departure from the principles

of the Law.

77. I pressed the point of view of the Singapore

authorities at some length and I urged the reasonableness

of the proposals made in 1930 and the desirability of

reaching a final settlement along some such lines. In

the course of my arguments I also referred to the

arrangement which we knew to be in existence between

the Chinese and Netherlands Governments under which Dutch

subjects of Chinese origin from the Dutch East Indies

returning to China for brief periods were registered and

protected by the Dutch Consuls. The Minister for

Foreign Affairs and Mr. Hsu Mo replied that that arrangement

was made more than twenty years ago before the present

Nationality Law had been promulgated; and they added

that the Chinese Government could not possibly follow

the precedent of so out-of-date an arrangement of which

they were in any case trying to disembarrass themselves.

8. The conversation concluded by my requesting the

Minister for Foreign Affairs to look into the matter

further and give me a definite reply to my letter to Dr.

Wang