CO129-563-16 Sino-Japanese War- attacks on shipping 6-9-1937 - 13-11-1937 — Page 43

In any further communication

on this subject, please quote

No. F 8795/130/10.

and address-

not to any person by name

but to-

"The Under-Secretary of State,"

Foreign Office,

London, S.W.1.

Important.

Duf

RECEIVED

4 - NOV 1937

C. O. REGY

FOREIGN OFFICE.

S.W.1.

3rd November, 1937.

54

43

Sir,

44.

With reference to your letter No. 53838/10/37 Important

of the 30th October, I am directed by Mr. Secretary Eden to

state that he feels some reluctance in concurring in the

publication either in Hong Kong or in this country of the

report of the Commission of Enquiry into the sinking of

Chinese fishing junks by Japanese naval forces before he

has been given an opportunity to study the terms of that

report. It is not clear to Mr. Eden that publication, or at

any rate immediate publication, is absolutely necessitated

by the fact of the evidence having been published and he

ventures to suggest, for the consideration of Mr. Secretary

Ormsby Gore, that the Officer Administering the Government

of Hong Kong should be instructed to refrain from publication

for the present and to send home copies of the report in

typescript in order that the question of publication may be

further considered here. Mr. Eden feels that there is already

much bitterness in Anglo-Japanese relations and that the terms

of a report which might further embitter those relations should

be a matter for the closest and most careful consideration.

I am,

Sir,

Your obedient Servant,

Gw. Onde

The Under-Secretary of State,

Colonial Office.