893.00/3268
The Consul General at Shanghai (Sammons) to the Chargé in China (Tenney)60
Sir: I have the honor to summarize the status of the internal peace negotiations as follows:
Mr. Tong Shao-yi stubbornly refuses to discuss the secret treaties with Japan or to receive members of the Northern Delegation relative thereto. He insists on the publication of the treaties and the [Page 395] loan negotiations between China and Japan by the Chinese and Japanese officials at Peking and Tokyo, respectively; and states that the Southern delegates to the internal peace conference stipulated that these agreements, after publication, should be cancelled. Mr. Tong also believes that the Chief Northern Delegate has not received all of the secret agreements, it being his view, of long standing, that some of these agreements are too shameful for the parties concerned to allow them to be scrutinized or made public.
The Northern delegates seem to assume that the matter is now in the hands of the Southern delegates, and more particularly in the hands of Mr. Tong Shao-yi, for suitable action in harmony with the proposals of the North to send the secret documents here for examination with a view to the resumption of the peace negotiations, which were broken off last May.
I am reliably informed that the documents received by Mr. Wang were not brought to Shanghai by an official, but were sent by registered mail, and that copies of the railway loan agreements were included.
Mr. Wang has confidence that the peace conference may soon resume sessions, while Mr. Tong seems to be very doubtful as to its resumption in the immediate future.
I have [etc.]
- Copy forwarded to the Department by the Consul General under covering letter of same date; received November 24.↩