and the boundary in the neighbourhood of Lake Kokonor threatened, in the event of his persisting in his refusal, to eliminate the clause recognizing the suzerainty of China, and ipso facto the privileges appertaining thereto from the draft Convention already initialled by the British and Tibetan plenipotentiaries.  In order to save the situation, the Chinese delegate initialled the documents, but on the clear understanding that to initial and to sign were two different things and that to sign he must obtain instructions from his Government.

China, dissatisfied with the suggested division into an Inner and Outer Tibet the boundaries of which would involve the evacuation of those districts actually in Chinese effective occupation and under its administration, though otherwise in accord with the general principles of the draft Convention, declared that the initialled draft was in no way binding upon her and took up the matter with the British Government in London and with its representative in Peking.  Protracted negotiations took place thereafter, but, in spite of repeated concessions from the Chinese side in regard to the Chinese side in regard to the boundary question, the British Government would not negotiate on any basis other than the initialled convention.  On July 3 an Agreement based on the terms of the draft Convention but providing special safeguards for the interests of Great Britain and Tibet in the event of China continuing to withhold her adherence, was signed between Great Britain and Tibet, not, however, before Mr. Ivan Chen had declared that the Chinese Government would recognize any treaty or similar document that might then or thereafter be signed between Great Britain and Tibet.

CHINA’S STANDPOINT

With the same spirit of compromise and a readiness to meet the wishes of the British Government and even to the extent of making considerable sacrifices in so far as they were compatible with her dignity, China has more than once offered to renew negotiations with the British Government but the latter has up to the present declined to do so.  China wants nothing more than the re-establishment of Chinese suzerainty over Tibet, with recognition of the autonomy of the territory immediately under the control of the Lhassa Government; she is agreeable to the British idea of forming an effective buffer territory in so far as it is consistent with equity and justice; she is anxious that her trade interest should be looked after by her trade agents as do the British, a point which is agreeable even to the Tibetans though apparently not to the British; in other words, she expects that Great Britain would at least make with her an arrangement regarding Tibet which should not be any less disadvantageous to her than that made with Russia respecting Outer Mongolia.