Simla Convention

This article is about the 1914 Tibetan-British-Chinese convention. For the 1972 India-Pakistan peace treaty, see Simla Agreement. For the 1906 deputation of Indian Muslim leaders for greater political representation, see Simla Deputation. For the 1945 Indian self-government meeting, see Simla Conference.

Simla Convention
Convention Between Great Britain, China, and Tibet
Tibetan, British and Chinese participants and plenipotentiaries to the Simla Treaty in 1914
Drafted27 April 1914
Signed3 July 1914
LocationSimla, Punjab Province, British India
Expiry23 May 1951
29 October 2008 (per United Kingdom)
Negotiators Paljor Dorje Shatra
Henry McMahon
Ivan Chen
Signatories
Languages

The Simla Convention (Traditional Chinese: 西姆拉條約; Simplified Chinese: 西姆拉条约), officially the Convention Between Great Britain, China, and Tibet,[1] was an ambiguous treaty[2] concerning the status of Tibet negotiated by representatives of the Republic of China, Tibet and Great Britain in Simla in 1913 and 1914.[3] The Simla Convention provided that Tibet would be divided into "Outer Tibet" and "Inner Tibet". Outer Tibet, which roughly corresponded to Ü-Tsang and western Kham, would "remain in the hands of the Tibetan Government at Lhasa under Chinese suzerainty", but China would not interfere in its administration. "Inner Tibet", roughly equivalent to Amdo and eastern Kham, would be under the jurisdiction of the Chinese government. The convention with its annexes also defined the boundary between Tibet and China proper and that between Tibet and British India (with the latter coming to be known as the McMahon Line).[1][a]

A draft convention was initialled by all three parties on 27 April 1914, but China immediately repudiated it.[4][5] A slightly revised convention was signed again on 3 July 1914, but only by Britain and Tibet. The Chinese plenipotentiary, Ivan Chen, declined to sign it.[6][7] The British and Tibetan plenipotentiaries then signed a bilateral declaration that stated that the convention would be binding on themselves and that China would be denied any privileges under the convention until it signed it.[8][9]

Without Chinese acceptance and also for its conflict with the Anglo-Russian Convention, the Government of India regarded the signed bipartite treaty in 1915 as "for the present invalid".[10][11][b] By 1921, the Anglo-Russian Convention was deemed to have lapsed, and the British felt free to deal with Tibet as an "autonomous State under the suzerainty of China", and, if necessary, "without further reference to China".[13][14]

  1. ^ a b "Convention Between Great Britain, China, and Tibet, Simla (1914)" Archived 9 September 2020 at the Wayback Machine, Tibet Justice Center. Retrieved 20 March 2009
  2. ^ Hoffmann 1990, p. 19: "McMahon's achievement seemed substantial at the time, but its meaning proved to be ambiguous at best."
  3. ^ Cite error: The named reference Goldstein1997p34 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  4. ^ Banerji, Borders (2007), p. 201: "... the draft treaty initiated by the three parties was subsequently revised, after consultations with Russia."
  5. ^ Mehra (1974), p. 275.
  6. ^ Hoffmann (1990), p. 19.
  7. ^ Mehra (1972), p. 299: "Ivan Chen, who had initialed the first earlier in April, kept his own counsel."
  8. ^ Hoffmann (1990), p. 19: "The Simla Convention itself was initialed again by the British and Tibetan conference leaders in Delhi on 3 July 1914, and they signed a joint declaration pronouncing the convention binding upon themselves, even without Chinese agreement."
  9. ^ Mehra (1972), p. 299: "A joint British-Tibetan declaration stipulating that its terms would apply to China only when the latter fell in line with its two other signatories was attached to the Convention."
  10. ^ Goldstein (1991), p. 80: [Quoting Government of India] "since the Simla Convention has not been signed by the Chinese Government or accepted by the Russian Government and is therefore for the present invalid".
  11. ^ Gupta (1971), p. 524.
  12. ^ Goldstein (1997), p. 26.
  13. ^ Mehra (1974), p. 417.
  14. ^ Goldstein (1991), pp. 397–398.


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