File 1356/1912 Pt 2 'Turco-Persian Frontier:- negotiations at Constantinople. (Mohammerah Boundary)' [‎200r] (408/680)

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[This Document is the Property of His Britannic Majesty's Government.]
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PEltSIA,
CONFIDENTIAL.
[March 19.]
Section 1.
[12714] No. 1 .
/ Report by Mr. Shipley.—{Received at Foreign Office, March 19, 1913.)
The Turco-Persian Frontier Commission, 1912.
THE subjects dealt with by the commission from the 25th March (The date of its
first sitting) to the 25th October (the date of its prolongation for three months) were
the following, viz. : —
}■ ^he question of the acceptance by the Persian delegates of the explanatory note
relating to Mohammerah attached to the treaty of 1848, the Turkish delegates declaring
at the outset of the proceedings of the commission that the note in question, which
formed an integral part of the treaty, must also be taken into consideration.
2 . Zohab and the claims of the respective parties to that province.
3. The limits of Suleimanieh as defined by the Persian and Turkish delegates
respectively.
The arguments respecting the first of these questions will be found in Proces-
verbaux Nos. 3 to 5. Briefly put, the contention of the Turkish delegates was to the
effect that the Ottoman Government had only consented to ratify the Treaty of
Erzeroum of 1848 on the express stipulation that the conditions constituting the
explanatory note were accepted by the Persian Government, and on formal notification
being given to the Porte by the representatives of the two mediating Powers, viz.,
Great Britain and Russia on the 26th February, 1848, of the acceptance by’ that
Government through its plenipotentiary, Mirza Mehmed Ali Khan, of the note in
question as an integral part of the treaty. The chief arguments made use of by the
Persians were—
( 1 .) That as their Government had no knowledge of this note it could not form an
integral part of the Treaty of Erzeroum.
(2.) That the note in question constituted a modification of the provisions of the
aforesaid treaty ; and, lastly, that, as in order to conclude or modify a treaty the
plenipotentiaries of both parties must be invested with full powers, the Anglo-Russian
note of 1848 could not be admitted by the Persian Government, Mirza Mehmed Ali
Khan not having full powers for this modification.
At the sitting, however, of the commission of the 15th August (Proces-verbal
No. 17) this question, which had formed the subject of no little discussion between tbe
i espective parties, was at length disposed of by the unconditional acceptance by the
Persian delegates of the note as forming an integral part of the treaty.
2. Zohab. —The question of the delimitation of this province and of the claims of
Persia and Turkey respectively thereto was dealt with by the commission in the sittings
from the 15th April to the 11 th July {Proces-verbaux Nos. 4 to 13).
The limits of this province were given by the Persian delegates in Proces-verbal
No. 4, as being formed on the south by the River Elwend as far as its junction with the
Shirwan, and from this latter point by the course of the last-mentioned river up to its
junction with the River Zimkian {vide Colonel Sheil’s map attached to the Foreign
Office memorandum of the 8 th December, 1906). Of the share in the province in
question claimed by the Persian delegates. According to their interpretation of the
provisions of article 2 of the Treaty of Erzeroum, by which the mountainous part with
the valley of Kerrind is given to Persia, it is sufficient to say that it is practically
identical with the line claimed by their predecessors in the commission of 1848-1852, as
shown in Colonel Shed’s map above referred to.
At the succeeding sitting {Proces-verbal No. 5) a definition of the limits of Zohab
based upon the land registers of the vilayet of Bagdad dating from 951 a.h. (1544 A.D.) was
given by the Turkish delegates in their turn. Previously, however, to giving this definition
certain districts, such as Kouretou, Tilekou, Ilourine, and Pusht-i-Kuh, were excluded
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