CO129-580-1 Sino-Japanese War- handing over of suspected terrorists to Japanese authorities 1-5-1939 - 24-8-1939 — Page 88

This Document is the Property of His Britannic Majesty's Government, and should be

returned to the Foreign Office if not required for official use.

T: CHIA.

Code telegram to Mr. Jamieson (Tientsin)

Foreign Orice, 13th June 1939.

4.CO p.m.

No. 53.

R.

00000000000000

62

88

IMMEDIATE.

54%

Your telegram No. 214 [of June 11th: Tientsin terrorists].

While procedure indicated in paragraph 1 must doubtless be

followed in dealing with ordinary criminal offenders it cannot be

rigidly followed in all cases where the complaint is one of a

political nature, and so long as we maintain a neutral status

for the Concession we must be satisfied before handing over

political offenders that there is prima facie evidence of an act

that would be a crime in ordinary circumstances.

My difficulty in acceding to the Japanese demand for the

surrender or the four men charged with the assassination of Cheng

is that so far as I have been informed there is no evidence

connecting them with the crime other than their own confessions

made while under detention by the Japanese Gendarmerie, and it

is alleged, under torture.

5 umpli

رة

Paragraph 3 of your telegram under reference is presumably an

amplification of the statement in your telegram No. 180 that two of

the four men having confessed to the Japanese subsequently re-

constructed the crime on the spot, and made similar admission under

no apparent duress to the Consul and Chief of Municipal Police.

I inferred that this latter admission was nevertheless made

while the men were still under Japanese detention because you went

on to say that when they were returned to the Municipal Council

they....