Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States, With the Annual Message of the President Transmitted to Congress December 8, 1908

File No. 774/406.

Ambassador Leishman to the Secretary of State.

[Telegram.]

American Embassy,
Constantinople, November 19, 1908.

Referring to your telegram of October 29, the embassy has received the following reply from the Sublime Porte:

[Translation.]

The Sublime Porte, appreciating the advantages which the reunion of such a commission will offer for humanity, has learned with great satisfaction of the initiative taken in this respect by the United States Government.

As the Ottoman Government, however, has no representative in China, and as it would be difficult to send there a special delegate, it finds itself, to its keenest regret, in the impossibility of participating in the labors of the commission referred to.

Leishman.