NO RENEWAL

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 20126, 20 April 1928, Page 8

NO RENEWAL

OLD CHINESE-PORTUGUESE TREATY When tho commercial treaty between China and Portugal of 1888 expires on April 28, according to advices from Shanghai and Peking, it will not be rencweid, although the way will remain open for Portugal to negotiate another treaty giving equitable treatment to China. This is the second of the old foreign treaties that China has declined to renew. Tho first was with Belgium which lapsed a year ago. Belgium at once laid the case before the League of Nations but later withdrew it and began to negotiate a new treaty which is still unsigned. The last Peking delegate to the League over a year ago made it clear ' that neither his Government nor any I Government that China was likely to have would renew any of the old treaties with theh Occidental powers. Tho. chief ol.jeetions to renewal arc that the old treaties were not equitable—the foreign signatories enjoyed by them extended extraterritorial rights over international zones and had their own courts. But in the case of Portugal when the decisions are not final they may be appealed to the higher court of Goa, Portuguese India, or to the Court of Appeal at Lisbon. Alone among foreign nations Germany, Austria and the Soviet Government of Russia have relinquished their extraterritorial rights in China, but with them no now treaties have been negotiated, except with Russia, whi'di is now considered: inoperative at Peking.