893.6359 Antimony/11
The American Chargé in China (Gauss) to the Chinese Acting Minister for Foreign Affairs (Wang)48
Excellency: I have the honor to inform Your Excellency that the Legation has received reports from the American Consulate General at Hankow from which it appears that the Hunan Provincial Government has granted to an organization known as the Hunan Antimony Syndicate monopoly rights for the sale and export of antimony [Page 768] from Hunan Province. In substantiation of these reports, the Consulate General has now communicated to the Legation telegrams exchanged with the Chairman of the Hunan Provincial Government. Copies of these telegrams are enclosed for Your Excellency’s information.49
It has further been reported that the Hunan Antimony Syndicate has been negotiating with a foreign firm at Hankow for the financing of the monopoly project in return for certain sole export privileges.
I must protest the monopoly arrangements of the Hunan Provincial Government for the control and export of antimony as in contravention of the treaty undertakings of China as set forth in Article XV of the Sino-American treaty of 1844,50 Article XIV of the Sino-French treaty of 1858,51 and Article III of the Nine Power Treaty concluded at Washington in 1922.52
I request that Your Excellency’s Government will, in accordance with its treaty obligations, take prompt and effective measures for the removal of the restrictions imposed by the action of the Hunan Provincial Government upon the purchase and export of antimony by American merchants.
I avail [etc.]
- Copy transmitted to the Department by the Chargé in China in his despatch No. 3195, December 17, 1934; received January 16, 1935.↩
- Neither printed.↩
- Signed at Wang Hiya, July 3, 1844; Hunter Miller (ed.), Treaties and Other International Acts of the United States of America, vol. 4, p. 559.↩
- Signed at Tientsin, June 27, 1858; British and Foreign State Papers, vol li, p. 636.↩
- Signed February 6, 1922; Foreign Relations, 1922, vol. i, p. 276.↩