Nor was there any support for the Formosan resistance movement in Peking, as considerable diplomatic efforts were then underway to persuade Japan to relinquish the Liaotung Peninsula. Under the terms of the Treaty of Shimonoseki, China had agreed to cede the peninsula to Japan, but once the treaty's contents became known there was alarm in Europe at Japan's rapacity. In a diplomatic demarche known as the Triple Intervention, Russia, France and Germany put pressure on Japan in late April 1895 to restore the peninsula to China. On 5 May the Japanese agreed to retrocede the Liaotung Peninsula to China in return for an increased indemnity, but it took until December 1895 to negotiate the necessary treaty amendments, and while the negotiations were in progress Japanese troops remained in place. During this period the empress dowager and her officials had excellent reasons not to offend Japan, and the Qing court was horrified when it heard the news in mid-May that several officials in Taiwan intended to resist the Japanese occupation and that there was talk of setting up a Republic that recognised Qing suzerainty. Shortly before the proclamation of the Republic of Formosa, the Qing court ordered Li Ching-fang, the nephew and adopted son of China's elder statesman Li Hung-chang, to proceed to Taiwan and formally transfer sovereignty over the island from China to Japan. It also cabled an imperial edict to Taipei on 20 May, directing Tang Jingsong to order all Qing civil officials and all officers and soldiers to leave Taiwan. Tang himself was ordered to return to Peking.