Minister went on, "has been in communication for some time with the Japanese Government on the position, and I am now able to announce that, as a result of the exchange of views between the British Government and the Japanese Government, it has been agreed that conversations shall take place in Tokyo, in order to effect a settlement of the various questions relating to conditions in Tientsin.
"Representatives of the local British and Japanese authorities will be invited to Tokyo for that purpose In view of these conversations, Mr. Chamberlain continued, the British Government assumed that there would be an end to stripping, searching and similar incidents in Tientsin and they had reason to hope this would in fact be the case.
In the circumstances, the British Government was not disposed to consider the advisability of referring the dispute to the League Council.
Asked if the conversations at Tokyo were limited to local issues, or if they covered the wider demands advanced by a Japanese spokesman at Tientsin, Mr. Chamberlain replied that the conversations related to the local issue.
He gave no answer when Major-
tive member for the Wycombe General Sir Alfred Knox, Conserve: livision of Buckinghamshire, asked whether, pending the result of the Tokyo conversations, the Prime Minister would insist that all interference with British subjects at Tientsin should "cease absolutely now; and would he point out that, as a Great Power, we have exercised greater patience during the past fortnight than any other Great Powers in history?"
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.