§ MR. BRYCEasked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Whether it is a fact that the Turkish authorities have lately been threatening, to close, and have in some cases actually closed, the schools of the American Missionaries in Armenia and Asia Minor, which have been so eminently serviceable to the Christian inhabitants of those countries; and, whether, if such be the fact, Her Majesty's Government have remonstrated, or will remonstrate, with the Turkish Government against such conduct, and endeavour to secure that the schools shall not be interfered with?
§ LORD EDMOND FITZMAURICESir, the Foreign Office have no very precise information as to the American Schools; but they are aware from the Reports of Her Majesty's Consuls that an attack was made on the American Missionaries near Bitlis, and that they were prevented from opening a school at Irjesh, and that the Armenian schools in the Vilayet of Van were closed. I may add that Her Majesty's Chargé d'Affaires received the thanks of the United States Government for the assistance which he rendered to the American Minister at Constantinople in connection with the former matters; and Lord Dufferin has taken every favourable opportunity of impressing upon the Porte the necessity of ameliorating the state of affairs in Kurdistan and Eastern Anatolia.
§ MR. BRYCEWould the Foreign Office have any objection to make an inquiry on the subject, with a view of ascertaining if the report in the newspapers as to the closing of the American missionary schools is well founded or not?
§ LORD EDMOND FITZMAURICEI shall have no objection to make inquiries.