Harbin, Aug. 15.
On account of recent incidents at Harbin with' the local Police, the British Consul is making efforts to get the authorities to bring about some radical reforms in the town police department. Since the trans-for of guarding and policing the Railway and the railway settlements in the C.E.R. area from Russian to Chinese hands, there have undoubtedly been many incidents that could have been avoided, but on the whole the Chinese police in the town are showing themselves keen and serious, and there is an actual decrease in crime during the last few months. The ignorance of the Russian language and Russian customs is, however, a great stumbling block, and for this reason the Russian and foreign population in Harbin do not consider the police capable of rendering such service as expected. At the present moment. though there is a number of Russians in the employ of the local police—in fact with the exception of former heads all other! wanks have been retained—the actual management is in Chinese hands and the number of Chinese whose services have been enlisted far exceeds the number of Russians.
What the British Consul suggests is that there be inaugurated a Russian and Chinese force who, though each commanded by their own nationals, shall work side by side, and that a limited Japanese force also be formed, the whole to be under the supervision of a Commissioner of Police who shall be neither a Russian, Chinese nor Japanese. Undoubtedly the present chief of police who has been recently installed by General Sung, the new Director-General of the O. BE. R., is not the right man in the right place, for he is merely a military officer and has no experience in police work even in China, let alone cosmopolitan community such as Harbin. Though some of his Chinese assistants are men of ex: perience and versed in the Russian language. the same cannot be said about the Russians who have recently been engaged by the Chinese. Of course it is an extremely difficult, matter for the Chinese to choose Russians who will prove themselves to be sans raproche.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.