File No. 861.0145/14.
[Inclosure.—Translation.]
The Minister for Foreign
Affairs to the Japanese Ambassador
to Russia.
In reply to the note verbale of -------- relative to the limits of
customs surveillance along the Russian coasts the Imperial Ministry
of Foreign Affairs has the honor to draw the attention of the
Imperial Embassy of Japan to the fact that in modern international
law there exists no generally accepted rule concerning the limits of
territorial waters within which sovereign state authority may be
exercised.
The question has been given widely different solutions either by
international treaties or the municipal laws of a state, and very
often in an unequal manner for the various protected interests
(customs regulations, fisheries, criminal or civil jurisdiction,
sanitary observation, etc.).
Thus an examination of the laws dealing with the question shows that
a great many States in Europe and America exercise undisputed
jurisdiction within limits that exceed the so-called ordinary zone
of three nautical miles.
Sections 2760, 2867, and 3067 of the Revised Statutes of the United
States of America, for instance, fix the limit of the jurisdiction
of American customs officers at 4 marine leagues (12 nautical
miles), exactly the distance set by the new Russian law of 1909.
The jurisdiction of British officers in all customs and quarantine
cases also covers (under Article XXIII of chap. 35 of the British
Act 9 Geo. II; Article XII of chap. 80 of Acts 39 and 40 Geo. Ill;
and Article I of chap. 47 of Act 24 Geo. Ill) a 4 marine-league
zone.
Finally, under the law of March 27, 1817, the customs marine zone of
France reaches out 2 myriameters from the coast.
Taking into consideration the above-cited provisions of laws against
which no State appears to have protested, together with the fact
that Russia is not bound by any international treaty fixing the
3-mile zone for the territorial waters and that therefore its area
cannot be measured from the viewpoint of international law except by
the range of the cannons on the coast (which now even exceed the
12-nautical-mile limit) the Imperial Government is unable to admit
that the Russian law of December 10, 1909, conflicts with
international law.
Lastly, the Imperial Ministry deems it its duty to recall to the
Japanese Embassy’s memory that the Institute of International Law
(whose authority on such questions is unquestionable) did not
hesitate to declare (as far back as 17 years ago, when it met at
Paris, in 1894) that the “usually adopted” distance of three miles
was absolutely insufficient. Fully concurring in that view, the
Netherlands Government soon thereafter (1895) took the initiative of
an international conference (unfortunately never going beyond the
stage of being contemplated) which was to give special attention to
the question of territorial waters and accurately define the law
common to all States, the lack of which the Imperial Government is
not the last to deplore.
It might perhaps be possible, should all the States interested
therein arrive at an agreement thereon, to include that question, of
such importance to international life, in the program of the
approaching Third Peace Conference that is to meet at The Hague
about 1915.
