Jun.
Grave consideration should be given to the proposals which are being made to extend to the In~ ternational Settlement in Shanghai the Government's' new scheme for the: progressive reduction of the opium traffic within a period of six The scheme itself is sound is the blessing of Geneva, in that it follows experience elsewhere by virtually legalizing the cultiva~ tion of poppy with the view of suppressing it by gradual stages. This is considered to be far more practical than the former system which under the cover of a uni~ versal prohibition actually. stimu-Jated the evil traffic owing to. the enormous prices obtainable for opium manufactured under such conditions. On principle the Settle~ iment authorities. are obviously bound to give sympathetic con~ sideration to whatever measures the Government may be disposed to commend for coping with the traffic within the mits of their jurisdic tion, At present the Council's officers take steps to prevent the sale of opium in the Settlement; they apply Chinese law to the arrest of addicts where found in conditions justifying such action. They also maintain a narcotic police section which, so far as is practic~ able, seizes illicit stocks of opium, raids opium dens and generally assists in stamping out the traffic. Admittedly their activities fall far short of perfection, owing to the peculiar circumstances of local administration and to the limited resources at their disposal, Apparently it is now proposed that the Council should adopt certain measures for ce-operating, in the six-year plan by establishing, 4 special suppression organization which will work on the basis of! legalizing the sale of opium on the monopoly principle. Under this scheme addicts will be registered and licensed by ce-operation with the Chinese authorities and certain' appointments will be made by the Government with the Council's acquiescence for the supervision and direction of the progressive reduction programme. On the face of! it this scheme is admirable, especial-Jy as it has been approved by the League of Nations Advisory Committee in its general application to China, On.that point the views of the Anti-Opium Information Bureau recorded on June 1, 1937 are relevant:
'The situation in China proves the. wisdom of the Chinese Government relegalizing opium and its sincerity in ite efforts to reduce the cultivation of opium. 'The Six-year Opium Suppression Plan of General Chiang Kal-shek promises fo prove' effective, if the situation created by the flooding of China with clandestinely manufactured narcotic drugs does not prevent the Government enforcing its suppress sion plan according to the time schedule established by General Chiang Kai-shek, Credit is due to the Chinese Government for the progress achieved, There remains, however, much to be done before the Government can overcome certain vested interests behind, the Melt trae in China.
The Shanghai Municipal Council has-carefully to take its knowledge of local conditions into account with special reference to the last sentence of that statement.
This journal has no hesitation in asserting that local influences of, most sinister significance'would im-
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.