Conference in Melbourne: Support for Sun Yat-sen Melbourne, Jan. 19.
One of the most important meetings for some time past interested the Chinese community of the Commonwealth during the recent Christmas and New Year holidays. During the week immediately succeeding Christmas Day the first Chinese Nationalist conference held in Melbourne was inaugurated in the presence of approximately 300 delegates. The previous convention was held in Sydney in April, 1919. The recent meetings were invested with greater interest in view of the presence in Melbourne of Mr. Chan On-yan, a special representative of Dr. Sun Yat-sen. Mr. Chan delivered a vigorous speech exhorting his fellow-countrymen to be patient and to do all in their power to help their leaders, who were now trying to crush militarism and despotic rule in China.
Among the subjects on the agenda was one relating to the present political situation in the Republic, and, after considerable debate, it was decided to despatch the following cable fo the Governments of Great Britain, the United States and France:—'This convention of Australian Chinese desires to point out that Dr. Sun Yat-sen is the legal President of China, inasmuch as he was elected by the members of the Chinese National Parliament, which represented the will of the people. We ask the Powers mentioned to accord him due recognition."
The Convention decided to_establish day and night schools at each of the branches in Australia, in order to teach Chinese-born children in the Commonwealth the Chinese national life and ideals.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.