CHINA’S DRASTIC WAY

Dominion, Volume 29, Issue 207, 29 May 1936, Page 11

CHINA’S DRASTIC WAY

Checking Opium Traffic 970 EXECUTIONS IN YEAR Geneva, May 27. Mr. Wellington Koo, Chinese Minister to France, told the League of Nations Opium Committee that 970 persons were executed in China last year for trading in and consumption of drugs. The Government had succeeded in restricting secret factories and traffickers. The biggest obstacle at present was the vast trade conducted by foreigners in China. In ito last report to the Council of the League of Nations, the Permanent Central Opium Board drew attention to the danger arising from the fact that more opium is grown in the world than can legitimately be consumed, and that accumulated stocks are increasing rather than diminishing. The report also deals with tlie manner in which Governments have fulfilled their obligations under the 1931 Convention as regards manufacture, imports, consumption and conversion of the drugs listed therein. It concludes that let® drugs were manufactured in 1934 than were needed to meet the world’s requirements, and that the stocks in hand at the end of the year were not unduly large. The reports also show that the consumption of drugs manufactured from both opium and coca leaves lias now fallen far below the world requirements of these drugs as estimated during the Limitation Conference in 1931. The stocks of the various drugs held nt the end of the year 1934 throughout the world amount to about one year’s consumption, which the board does not think excessive.