'File 14/115 VII Annex (B 9) Abu Musa oxide: collected background material on the case' [‎14v] (39/1904)

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partnership admitting Malcolm (Annex. 33) and the inclusion therein, in Ab
dullah bin Hasan's handwriting, of the express condition that " it is not open to
any one of the partners to sell his share or to admit any one therein except in
consultation with Haji Hasan bin Ali Samaiyeh and with his signature together
with those of the partners." This again is emphasized in Hasan's letter on the
subject to Abdul Lati-f (Annex. 41). It would be quite open to us to argue from
this emphatic condition, brought into operation on 13th Shaaban 1316—27th
Lecember 1898—that the sale by Shi.ikh Sagar of his share to Yusuf bin Abdullah
a month later (17th Raruian 1316—30th January 1899) was invalid because it
did not bear the signature of any of the partners—and that the sale* of the same
share by Yusuf to Hasan on the 15th Shaaban 1318—8th December 1900,was
doubly illegal.
In this connection the bearing of the letter of Hasan Samaiyeh to Abdul Latif
of 7th January 1900 is particularly important. It will be seen that it was
specifically in connection with the Yusuf Abdullah share, then in the mar
ket, that Hasan introduced the prohibition against any partner selling his share
or admitting an outsider without consulting him and all the partners. He con
gratulates Abdul Latif for preventing Yusuf from selling the share to a foreigner,
and says we are better entitled to take the share and
Notwithstanding this he very soon afterwards bought Yusuf's share himself,
and refrained in connection therewith from fulfilling the necessary condition which
he himself had made but a few months before. Neither the signature of Esa, nor
Malcolnj, nor Nakhoda Ali, was taken on the transfer; and no one heard anything
about it until Hasan went somewhat out of his way to inform the Residency An office of the East India Company and, later, of the British Raj, established in the provinces and regions considered part of, or under the influence of, British India. Agent,
Lingah, of the fact in October 1906, and the latter reported it to me on the 2nd
November. (See Annexes 31 and 40).
{70) **The Imperial Government for the
convinced of the illegality of the eancellvng of —Our reply to this is that
the question of the cancelling of the agreement between three British subjects and a
Slu-ikh in treaty relation with us is a matter concerning us and him alone, and that
the German Government have no locus to pronounce upon it.
(72) It was evidently the aim of Shaikh
rights enjoyed by Mr, WoncJchaus under supply
illusory for the benefit of his competitors. —This is an unfounded assumption.
Shaikh Sagar had no ideas of the kind.
{72) His proceedings are an infraction
tion of which in those regions His Majesty's —
On the contrary it was precisely in order to prevent any lawlessness, or any un
necessary rough-handling of British subjects that the presence of was
ordered. (See also Item I).
* (Enclosure 4 C. to First, German MemoraadJin.