File No. 5767/142.
[Inclosure.—Translation.]
The Minister for Foreign
Affairs to Ambassador O’Brien.
Department of Foreign Affairs.,
Tokyo, November 25, 1909.
Mr. Ambassadeur: The note which Your
Excellency did me the honor of addressing to me under date of the
13th instant, on the subject of the agreement recently concluded
between Japan and China respecting matters of common concern in
Manchuria, was duly received.
Your Excellency in that note invites attention to the statement which
I made to you on the 11th instant, to the effect that the intentions
and claims of the Imperial Government, as made known by their
previous assurances, remain unchanged in the presence of the
agreement in question, and after referring to a communication from
your Government respecting especially Articles III and IV of that
agreement, and to my offer to explain in a more formal manner, if
desired, the actual situation, you add the suggestion that it would
be for the interests of all parties concerned, if that offer were
carried out.
Anxious at all times not only to promote the relations of good
understanding between our two countries, to which the Imperial
Government always attach the highest value, but to give added proof
of Japan’s loyalty to the principle of equal opportunity, I gladly
take advantage of the occasion which Your Excellency’s suggestion
affords me.
By the terms of the agreements creating the lease of Port Arthur and
its neighborhood, Russia acquired certain rights on the Liao-tung
Peninsula, and in pursuance of the Harbin-Port Arthur Railway
concession, the same power acquired for the purpose of duly working
the concession, certain property rights along the railway line.
By virtue of the treaties of Portsmouth and Peking, the lease of Port
Arthur, Talien, and adjacent territory and territorial waters, and
all rights, privileges, and concessions connected with or forming
part of such lease, and the railway between Chang-chun and Port
Arthur and all its branches, together with all rights, privileges,
and properties appertaining thereto in that region, as well as all
coal mines in the said region belonging to or worked for the benefit
of the railway, were fully and definitely assigned and transferred
to the Government of Japan.
The collieries at Fushun and Yuentai are two of the mines so assigned
and transferred, and they are both being actively exploited. The
agreement, which forms the subject of the present correspondence,
makes no new1
concession in connection with those mines. It merely recognizes the
existing exclusive right of Japan to work them.
The “general principles” referred to in the agreement in question,
which, lacking the necessary confirmation of the Governments
concerned, remained for the time being ineffective, relate
exclusively to known mines—only a few in number—which have been
actually located by Japanese.
Consistently with the foregoing explanation which I permit myself to
hope Will satisfy the solicitude of Your Excellency’s Government, I
am happy to be able to add the assurance that the provisions of the
agreement of September 4 last, in reference to joint exploitation of
mines along the said railways do not and were not intended in any
way or to any extent to involve a monopoly of the right to discover,
open, and operate mines in Manchuria, to the exclusion of American
citizens, or any other persons.
I avail, etc.,
