IN NORTHERN CHINA

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 76, Issue 109, 11 May 1933, Page 10

IN NORTHERN CHINA

AN INDEPENDENT STATE. NEW JAPANESE MOVE. PEKING, April 25. A movement to establish in North China a pseudo-independent State called Huapekuo is widely reported in the Chinese Press. It is predicted that renegade Chinese forces will occupy the Peking-Tient-sin area with Japanese assistance, and establish a puppet regime under the control of a Japanese garrison at Tientsin. The papers warn the Nanking Government to rush reinforcements northward if it wishes to keep the PekingTientsin area as part of China. Commenting on these reports, foreign observers agree that marked political changes are pending in North China. Some obser\* rs are of the opinion that, the Japanese will transfer Henry Pu-Y’i from the present Manchukuo capital, Changchun, to Peking. He is the heir to the former Empire of China, being a descendant of the Manchus, and the present Chief Executive of the State of Manchukuo. Martial law has been declared in Peking and Tientsin. The populace is in a panic. Anti-aircraft guns are being mounted on the pipings of old ramparts, and preparations are being made to move the remaining art treasures to places of safety. Discussing the possibility of a political coup d’etat in the Peking-Tientsin region, a spokesman for the Japanese Legation said no such movement would receive Japanese support. A widely-circulated rumour that the British Ambassador to China (Sir Milos Lampson) is negotiating for a SinoJapancse armistice, is emphatically denied by British Legation officials. “No such negotiations are in progress, and no proposals have actually been received by Sir Miles from either K side, though the Ambassador is naturally keeping in close touch with the situation and carefully watching developments,” the officials said.