INDIGNATION AT SHANGHAI

Southland Times, Issue 23839, 9 June 1939, Page 7

INDIGNATION AT SHANGHAI

JAPANESE MURDER OF BRITISH SUBJECT

ANGER OVER STATEMENT BY SPOKESMAN

(United Press Assn. —Telegraph Copyright) (Independent Cable Service) LONDON, June 7.

A wave of indignation has swept the European community at Shanghai over the fatal bayoneting of Mr R. M. Tinkler, a British mill employee at Pootung, who died as the result of wounds inflicted by a Japanese marine. The tension has not been lessened by a statement by a spokesman of the Japanese Embassy that Mr Tinkler’s action was a deliberate insult to Japan. “I am surprised that he was not shot on the spot,” the spokesman said. Mr Tinkler was a former member of the Shanghai municipal police and had been employed .at the Pootung mill for some years. Officials in Whitehall point out that, undoubtedly as the result of deliberate instigation by the Japanese, there had 1 been considerable labour agitation at the mill which caused the employees to riot. Finally, on May 20, an. armed British naval guard was stationed at the mill but a few days later assurances were given by the Japanese that British lives and property, which were imperilled as a result of the fomented riots, would be adequately protected. This led to the withdrawal of the guardBritain has protested to Tokyo against the inadequate fulfilment of the Japanese undertaking that an armed guard would protect the British mills at Pootung and has expressed a serious view of the death of Mr Tinkler.

A Japanese naval spokesman at Shanghai alleges that Mr Tinkler was involved in the disorders, was disarmed by a Japanese marine, and was then surrounded by Japanese with fixed bayonets, “when he may have come into contact with a bayonet.” .It is denied, however, that he was wilfully stabbed.

The Japanese Embassy spokesman cited Mr Tinkler’s fate as an example of summary action against foreigners trespassing on Japanese rights, and added that anyone endangering the Japanese forces would be indefinitely detained and even executed. He admitted that in spite of a British request that Mr Tinkler be immediately handed over this was done only after his death, fifteen hours after he was wounded.

A spokesman of the Japanese Consulate expressed surprise that Mr Tinkler was not shot and killed on the spot after “arrogantly pointing and firing a revolver at a Japanese.”