§ 37. Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHYasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether the British naval authorities on the Yangtse are interfering 1640 with the use of railway trucks for the transport of the Nationalist troops of General Chiang Kai-Shek in his operations against the Northern Governments of China; and, in view of his previous declarations of neutrality between the contending Governments in China, will similar prohibitions be placed on any future attempt of the forces of the Northern Generals to cross the Yangtse from the North?
§ The SECRETARY of STATE for FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Sir Austen Chamberlain)In view of the fact that the whole of the property of the Shanghai Nanking Railway is mortgaged to British interests as the security for the railway loan, representations have been made on every occasion when there has been a threat or attempt to transfer rolling stock of this railway across the Yangtse for military purposes, with the object of checking the transfer. As recently as 21st March last His Majesty's Consul-General at Nanking was instructed to make representations of this nature to General Chang Tsung-chang and to obtain assurances that his proposed removal of rolling stock would not be put into effect. Accordingly, when on 17th May the Secretary of the General Officer Commanding 40th Army informed the captain of His Majesty's Ship "Carlisle" of the proposal to transfer rolling stock of the Shanghai Nanking Railway from Nanking to Pukow, he was told that this could not be permitted.
These representations are founded solely on the Loan Agreement and on the rights conferred by it. In the case of the Tientsin Pukow Railway there is no mortgage of property or rolling stock and there would not therefore be the same legal ground on which to base a protest. The captain of His Majesty's Ship "Carlisle" has been directed to raise no objection to the transhipment from Nanking to Pukow by the Nationalist Army of trucks and armoured cars belonging to the Tientsin Pukow Railway.
§ Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHYIs it not a fact that in the case of nearly all the railways in China, except the Eastern Chinese Railway, there is a great deal of British capital sunk, and would not the right hon. Gentleman be 1641 equally justified in preventing the use of rolling stock by Chang Tso-Lin, for example?
§ Sir A. CHAMBERLAINI shall be glad to have the hon. and gallant Gentleman's argument on that submitted to me in writing. As at present advised, I do not think that the circumstances of other railways are the same as those of this railway.