Steps for Settlement of an Ancient Question Tokyo, Sept. 23.
Calling on the Foreign Ministe:, Count Yasuya Uchida, yesterday afternoon, the British Ambassador, Sir Francis Lindley, submitted proposed measures for settlement of the ancient question of vertwanent land leases by foreigners in Kobe and Yokohama, it wes learned to-day.
Count Uchida accepted the proposal to open negotiations based on the plan. It was understood that the scheme provides in part: (1) That British nationals will abandon their lease rights and recognise jurisdiction of the Japanese Government in future and (2) That Britons will pay taxes to the Japanese Government on their land,—United Press, Harbin, Sept, 13.
Harbin is to-day once more without any railway communication of any kind, the eastern and western lines being impossible owing to the Chinese insurgents who are making themselves at home there, while the railway management do not want to despatch any trains on the southern line until adequate protection is afforded to the passengers.
The experience of the past tw days is of such a nature that nobody cares to risk his life by travelling over a lin¢ which is infested with bandits ready to cut the railway track and rob even the poorest of the passengers. The sight which met the eye of those who were at the station when the train reached Harbin yesterday, will not be forgotten. There was the world known adviser of the South Manchuria Railway Ca. Mr. H. W. Kinngy, wrapped in a blanket taken from a railway car, groping about in the brilliant sunshine, as his cycglasses had Been taken from him, the only consolation being, that the bandits had left him his pipe (though without the tobacco pouch) There was Mr. Hassek, Far Eastern Inspector of the Wagons-lits Company, who was clothed in some old ragged clothes bought from some villager at Shuangchenpu, and_ his assistant, in a similar suit, while a score of others presented the most comical appearance as they descended from the freight car in which they had travelled to Harbin from the spot of the disaster. Though everybody had lost all their luggage and money, they yet seemed to be more than satisfied that they had been let off without being dragged into the woods, or being wounded by stray shots.
The sad sight was the C.E.R. sanitary car with its medical attendants, and the wounded passengers, the son of the C.E.R. Board member, Mr. Fang Tse-kuang, lying with his face entirely bound up in bandages saturated with blood, and with a bullet in his right shoulder. The C.E.R. President himself Mr. Li Shao-keng, came down to the station to speak a kindly word to_the young man, who only a month ago graduate ed as an engineer at the Polytechnic Institute, Harbin. He was quickly conveyed to the Central Hospital where an operation was performed by Dr. Ogilvie and the bullet successfully extracted. The Japanese wounded soldiers and the Japanese injured passengers were cared for by the Japanese ambulance staff, the dead soldiers being carried off in a special van to the crematorium.
To-morrow, it is proposed to run a train to Changchun in the daytime, properly guarded by a strong detachment of Japanese soldiers in armoured cars and with machine guns on a platform.
On the western line there seems to be little doubt that the Japanese small detachment at Anta was wiped out to a man (said to numer about 250) and that there are <ome 10,000 insurgents who are in complete control of the station and the settlement, requiring a very strong force to remove them.
consequence of the attack on the Hongkong and Shanghai Bank managers and the railway incidents, the Consular Body yesterday held a meeting at the residence of the U.S. Consul-General, Mr. G. C. Hanson. It was considered that the situation in Harbin had become unsafe for foreign life and property, a resolution being passed to request the local, authorities to provide better protection in the shape of more and better qualified police, and to propose that a Volunteer Corps of foreign residents should be organised. The finances of the Municipal Council and the Police are not in such a very good condition that further expense can be incurred, but the idea of a Volunteer Corps seems a good one and should be adopted, though unfortunately the authorities are not much inclined to accept help from foreigners at the moment.
The Mayor of Harbin, Mr. Bao Kuan-chen, has made his farewell speech before proceeding to his appointment in Japan as the representative of Manchukuo, He is young man of great energy, full of great ideas regarding the future of the country, which he considers will prosper exceedingly under the new rulers. So far nothing but ruin and disaster has fallen on Manchuria since it became a new state, and it will be a long time before it recovers from the blow that has been struck this year. Mr? Hirota, a Japanese, has been appointed in Mr. Bao's place and thus another high post is taken over by Japan. Police Headquarters are now entirely controlled by Mr. Yagi, as the Chinese From Our Own CorResPoNDENT police master has not been seen at his post for days, and in any case, has not much to say in affairs -on-cerning police matters. The' Post Office is now in the hands of Japanese managers, as well og the Customs and the Telegraph and Telephone, the Chinese only occupying minor_ positions, These Japanese are in almost all cases, called Manchoukuo citizens, Though there are some optimistic Prophets who state that the new crops in Manchuria are not so badly damaged as the papers write, this is not the case, the loss running into millions of tons. Now that the floods are subsiding and reports are reaching Harbin of the condition of the crops for 1932, it can be - een that they are very far from pleasant reading. The Tsitsihar Agricultural Department states that the losses are enormous, pointing out that in the upper reaches of the Nonni the wheat sowings have been washed out or have become rotten under the deep water. There will not be more than 20 per cent. of last year's crop of wheat in that district, while in he Keshan district fully 75 per cent. of the wheat crop is also ruined. Reports from Kirin Province are very similar to the Tsitsihar ones, besides which, the sowings have been less than last year, though in other grain than wheat, it is probable that the crop will reach 40 per cent. In the Harbin district the wheat crop will also be much lower than that of last year, probably 50 per cent., while other grain will show from 30 to 40 per cent. In beans the loss from the floods will not be so great as the plant comes up much later than wheat, and the present warm weather is assisting it to throw off the effect of the water. But even allowing that the bean crop is about GO to 70 per cent. of last year the total crop will be only a half of last year and probably even below this figure. There will thus be a shortage of those grains which are required for food, while the bean surplus for export will amount to very little, the most going for the use of oil mills in the country. The wheat crop will be so small that it is probable some wheat will have to Be, ta ported from Canada or the S.A.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.