The functioning of a censorship Board in the Settlement was attacked a statement issued by the League Jof Cultural Groups following its formal inauguration on July 11 at the Chinese Chamber of Commerce building, North Honan Road.
'The League, known as the League of Shanghai Cultural Groups for the Abrogation of the Shanghai Municipal Counei's Rights to Censor Chinese Plays, Songs and Motion Pictures, was organized by Chinese Motion Picture Producers' Guild, the Pen Club, the Chinese Dramatic Club, the Chinese Literary Association, the Dramatic Writers' "Association, the National Educational Motion Picture "Associa and twenty other similar organization.
According to a2 member of the League, the Executive Yuan has ordered the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to study the issue.
Shanghai,, July 12, For the past week interest Russian Shanghai's 20,000 has been concentrated on one topie—the order of the Chinese authorities forbidding the issuing of passports and vis to Russian emigrants until the latter have paid their income tax for a Period' of six months from January 1, 1937. Russian emigrants, with all their eighteen years of wandering on foreign strands, have learned to respect existing laws and regulations, and do°not favour protests, preters ring to submit to the demands of authorities and police silently and without undue criticism, But situations sometimes arise when to carry out a. certain regulation becomes extremely dificult, if not impossible, Thus it is, to some, with the present income tax. It was imposed forcibly Russian emigrants, and, as if intentionally, at a time when Russian Drepare to leave for summer resorts, As we have already pointed out in hose columns, a summer resort is to Russian not primarily a place of rest and recreation, but is either a continuation of the struggle for their €aily bread or a means of repairing health, undermined by heavy work under' arduous conditions ina subtropical climate. That 75 per cent. of the children in Russian schools who this spring underwent a medical examination were found to be in Immediate need of being sent to a summer resort, speaks for the fort That health isa boon. of which not many Russians in Shanghai can boast. And here, in such conditions, arises the necessity not only. to find the means of leaving Shanghai, but to make an immediate payment of income tax covering 2 period of six months, and, in some eases, even paying fines for overdrawn passports; as all reductions in regard to. passports and visas which Ruse sians have always enjoyed in China, were simultaneously discontinued, Some Hardships Chinese authorities cannot be ignorant of the fact. that literally scores of Chinese pawnbrokers work in. Shanghai for a purely Russian "clientele." In order to leave Shang~ hal for the summer months Russian nearly always pawn everything of their possession which can. be pawned, and in addition draw loans from credit companies. Of this modest sum, which already is barely sum-lent to send his wife and children to Tsingtao, the indigent Russian how must leave a large part at the Income Tax Bureau in Kiukiang Road. The writer is fomitiar with the case of a Russian reporter, who does not earn more than $100 a month, but who, in addition to his income tax for a period of six months, must pay $27 for an overdrawn pass port, Meanwhile the man is so-Fioualy ill, and his doctors sent him to Loashan. A Russian family which considered. well-to-do lives, at an average, on the husband's salary of about $400, In these _clreumstances the income tax, amounting to about $75, must at once be paid. Russians contrive to secure at the most a auk-loan of $400, and with this they send their families to Tsingtao for a period of two montht, Thus a quarter of the loan, on which high rates of percentage are exacted. must now go to the Income Tax, Bureau, These are some of the facts which explain the present agitation around the question of the suddenly introduced Income tax. Russians have 00) always agreed that income tax must bbe paid, but at the same time bollove that certain debatable points should first be softied. Here are some of these points:—The introduction of income tax has not done away with the necessity of procuring a visa costing $4 0 person on going to a closely nelghbouring port like, say, Tsingtao, More than that, ° on arriving a Russian emigrant who has ved in China for the Fast Afteen or eighteen years, and who thus considers him-Self 4 permanent resident of this country, must for some unknown Reason, once more pay $450 per person' for a Tsingtao passport. Paying their income tax, "Russian emigrants are, neither in the French Concession nor In the Settlement, exempted from their house-taxes and other Municipal taxes which continue a matter of course. Thus Russian emigrants, the poorest and Toast secure part of the foreign population, of Shanghai, must henceforward pay considerably more taxes than more 'ament foreigners, Russian emigrants, we repeat, are quite willing to pay their income tax, but ask that this income tax be exacted from them when it is exacted from all other non-treaty foreign residents of Shanghai, Why start with the emigrants?
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.