Directory_and_Chronicle_1939 — Page 173

Monsieur le Ministre,

EXTRATERRITORIALITY

CHINESE REPLY TO FRANCE.

Nanking, September 7, 1929.

147

I have the honour to acknowledge the receipt of Your Excellency's Note of August 10th in which you are good enough to transmit to me the views of your Government in regard to the request of the Chinese Government, con- tained in my Note of April 27th for the removal of restrictions on China's jurisdictional Government.

The Chinese Government is pleaded to be reminded by the French Govern- ment that it gave another proof of the friendly feelings it always entertained towards the Chinese people by signing the Tariff Autonomy Treaty last year. The friendship between China and France rests not only on common material interests, but also on close cultural ties and the ideals which have been an unfailing source of inspiration both to the Chinese and the French people in their political evolution. It is therefore with pleasure that the Chinese Government takes note of the sympathetic response of the French Government to the desire of China expressed in my last Note.

In your Note under acknowledgment, however, reference is made to the Report of the Commission on Extraterritoriality submitted to the interested Governments, pursuant to a resolution adopted at the Washington Conference. The French Government is undoubtedly aware of the fact that since the completion of that report, conditions in China have greatly changed, and, in particular, both the political and judicial systems have assumed a new aspect. To pass judgment on the present state of laws and judicial administra- tion in China in the light of what is contained in the Report of 1926 is doing no justice to the steadfast policy of the National Government.

Furthermore, it may be worth while to recall the circumstances under which the French Government renounced its rights under the Capitulations with Turkey. The Chinese judicial system, it will be admitted, does not suffer the least in comparison with that of Turkey at the time of the abolition of the Capitulations. And yet the French Government, realizing that the Turkish people with legitimate aspirations and under the guidance of a new and strong Government could accomplish great things in a short space of time, had the wisdom and foresight to relinquish its special privileges similar to those enjoyed hitherto by its nationals in China and has had the satisfaction to find that the life and property of French citizens in Turkey have subsequently received full and adequate protection. The French Government which did full justice to the Turkish people in the matter of jurisdiction without any apprehensions and with satisfactory results will no doubt solve the problem of Extraterritoriality in China in the same friendly and sympathetic spirit.

It has been perhaps brought to the knowledge of the French Government that the Chinese Government has recently concluded treaties with several other Powers which have agreed to relinquish extraterritorial privileges on January 1st, 1930. If it had appeared to the Governments of those Powers, as it appears to the French Government, that there did not yet exist in this country a judiciary capable of rendering justice to their nationals and a body of laws adequate to give protection to their lives and property, they would certainly have refused to give up their privileged position and enter into the engage- ments they have made. Now that many of the Powers which participated in the discussions of Extraterritoriality of the Washington Conference have already shown by an overt act that that system has outlived its usefulness and should be replaced by one in harmony with the actual state of things, there is no reason why the French Government, which played an important part in the deliberation of that Conference, should not act in unison with those Powers, thus removing the difficulty which the Chinese Government might otherwise en- counter in extending jurisdiction over all foreign nationals.