"مذكرة تتعلق بالملاحة في نهري دجلة والفرات". [و‎‎١‎١‎٦] (٢٨٤/٢٣٢)

3 J
79
1910—(con*.)
Euphrates and
Tigris Steam
Navigation
Company,
July 20
[26401/10].
Sir G. Lowther,
No. 126,
Telegraphic,
July 4
[24253/10].
Sir G. Lowther,
No. 598,
August 23
[31381/10].
Sir G. Lowther,
No. 824,
November 8
[41320/10].
1911.
Mr. Marling.
No. 52,
January 18,1911.
[2492/11].
nominal Turkish, company to run it. In a later
letter they urged that the Turkish Government,
if they altered the status quo on the rivers by the
extension of the right of navigation to private
persons, should remove the disabilities of the
company, who were limited to the employment
of three steamers which the Turkish authorities
sought to restrict to use on the Tigris only.
Sir G. Lowther had previously stated that the
Porte and Turkish Parliament were not likely
to consider that the old claims of 1846 and 1860
(1861) entitled the company to rim steamers on
the Euphrates, and now, in response to a request
for his opinion as to the likelihood of the
Turkish Government consenting to the " removal
of existing restrictions on the company's rights
or to the explicit recognition of their right to
ply on both rivers up to the limit of their
navigability," he said that no hope could be
entertained of those rights being extended either
as regards the number of ^their steamers on the
Tigris or their being permitted to ply on the
reaches above Bagdad or on the Euphrates. In
reference to the grant of navigation permits to
Ottoman subjects, and to the proposals made in
the company's letter of the 3rd June respecting
navigation of the Euphrates, Sir G. Lowther
explained that Abdul Hamid's civil list properties
in Mesopotamian regions had been transferred
on his deposition to the Ministry of Finance, and
after the breakdown of the fusion scheme the
Government monopoly had been abolished in
favour of the principle of throwing open the
navigation of both rivers to Ottomans, lie con-
sidered it futile, therefore, for the company qud
foreigners to apply for a permit to send a tug
and barge up the Euphrates, or for a permit
to form an Ottoman company to ply on the
rivers.
1911. —In reference to a question asked by the
Euphrates and Tigris Steam Navigation Company
as to the participation of foreign capital in
Turkish enterprises for the navigation of the
Tigris and Euphrates, His Majesty's chargd
d'affaires at Constantinople observed that the
old regime considered the company's position to
be an infringement of the Civil List's {i.e.,
Government's) monopoly of navigation on the
Tigris, and the present Government, while re
fraining from any attempt to deprive the
company forcibly of their acquired rights, were
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