Sessional_Paper_1927 — Page 68

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the difficulties of operating from this centre are sufficiently great to drive them else- where where their road is easy, and as long as the Colony can hold this position in rela- tion to other ports, further precautions in this direction may even lay themselves open to the charge of being unnecessarily stringent. What is required is a common level of search throughout the ports concerned, and such search to be completely effective must be backed by an efficient detective system ashore. Hong Kong has set a standard in this matter, both ashore and afloat, high enough to drive the pirates to other centres. It remains for those other centres to take measures for driving them still further until they are finally driven off the face of the map of the China coast.

There is also put forward a plan for searching, which deserves further examina- tion in the light of the recent s.s. "Ko Chow" incident. Briefly the plan is that all in- tending passengers should file past detectives, or should be paraded before them, so that the detectives should 'spot' undesirables. In the case of the s.s. "Ko Chow" a number of concealed revolvers was found under conditions, which made it highly probable that a gang of pirates was actually on board. A close examination by the Police of all the pas- sengers resulted in the detention of a number of suspects. Suspicion however was only based on the fact that the detained men spoke the same dialect as the man who had charge of the revolvers, and that they came from the same district at about the same time tails of this nature could not be elicited in an ordinary parade, nor would they form ground for action unsupported by some good reason such as the previous discovery of the revolvers. This discovery, it should be noted was directly due to alertness on the part of the ship's personnel.

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Most of the views on points of detail of individual members of the Shipping Sub- committee of the Chamber of Commerce are dealt with in their appropriate paragraphs. The remainder consists of suggestions for small additions to the defensive equipment of the ship, such as should lie well within the competence of the Captain to provide without reference to the Piracy Prevention Regulations.

The Commissioners note with some disappointment that the letter from the Cham- ber of Commerce contains no suggestion that action on the part of the owners or of the officers by way of precaution against attack is called for. Destructive criticism rather than constructive suggestion is foreshadowed in the following extract from a member's opinion included in the letter:

"When the report of the Commissioners of the "Sunning" Piracy is complete it will no doubt show to what extent the Regulations were carried out, and whether it was found impossible to put certain Regulations into practice. The shipping sub-committee will be in a better position to offer suggestions for the improvement of existing conditions after the Report is presented.

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The Regulations indeed ever since their institution appear to have provided an opening for destructive criticism which has been seized to the detriment of constructive and independent action; and the Commissioners have been influenced by this view in making their final recommendations.

2. The root of piracy.

It is a common-place to repeat that the elimination of piracy on the China coast must await improvement in the condition of the country as a whole, and that while no effort is made to deal with pirates in their lairs ashore by their own Government, and while the efforts of those with power throughout the land end only in the encouragement of disorder and destruction, so long will piracy flourish and increase. Given the will, it would be a simple matter for any Chinese authority to smoke out such a notorious nest as Bias Bay, and to keep it under control: but until the Chinese can be induced to take ac- tion themselves, or to allow action to be taken in the common interests, the risk of piracy in Chinese waters will remain. We say this much on the point not because we have any doubt that the Hong Kong Government is making every possible effort in the direction of eliminating pirates ashore, but because a reference that calls for "recommendations as to the measures necessary for preventing piracy" cannot otherwise be answered. Wholly to prevent piracy involves a destruction of the conditions which breed pirates, the com- mon duty of every civilised Government.