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Show CHINA IS NOT TO SION TREATY) WASHINGTON. June 27-Announce-I ment by the Chinese peace delegation' in Paris today that China would not1 sign the peace treaty is in line with' the instructions sent the delegation I several weeks ago by the Chinese gov- J ernment. These instructions were to refuse to sign the treaty unless some reservation was permitted as to Ja- pan's sovereignty over the Shantung peninsula, acquired by Germany from China under the treaty of 1897. These instructions, it was learned ioday. have been changed and accordingly accord-ingly the announcement of the Chinese delegation vas not surprising to of f i -ciala here. Until very recently, how- er, it was considered here as possible pos-sible that China might sign the treaty in view of private assurances said to hnve been given her representatives that Japan's tenure of Shantung would not be long. China, it also had been believed, probably would assent to the treaty and leave the Shantung question ques-tion to be worked out bv the league of nations. The f'hinese deciaion was believed here to he based on tho following First, that the delegation was unable to obtain definitely expressed assurances assur-ances that Japan would give up the Shantung province within a short spc-i spc-i hied time and that the Japanese tenure ten-ure would not be permitted to run for the remainder of the ninety-nine year period under which Germany held the territory, and. Second, that definite assurances were lacking that Japan would relinquish relin-quish control of the railroad from Ting Tao to Tsin Aufu, including all facilities and mining rights and privileges privi-leges of exploitation; of the Tsing Tao -Shanghai -Che Foo cables, and of i lacilities at the port of Kiao Chau. Failure of China to sign tho treaty, officials explained, probably will exclude ex-clude her from the league of nations including certain rights of redress under un-der that covenant as well as work to her detriment in the resumption of trade. |