File 1356/1912 Pt 2 'Turco-Persian Frontier:- negotiations at Constantinople. (Mohammerah Boundary)' [‎311r] (630/680)

[This Document is the Property of His Britannic Majesty’s Government]
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PERSIA.
CONFIDENTIAL.
[37863]
[September 9.]
Section 2.
. 1912
NeH-r
Mr. Marling to Sir Edward Grey.—(Received September 9.)
(No. 749.)
Sir, Constantinople, September 4, 1912.
I CALLED on the Minister for Foreign Affairs yesterday, and asked his
Excellency whether he had found time to examine the proposals regarding the Turco-
Persian frontier in the neighbourhood of Mohammerah, which had been communicated
to Tewfik Pasha An Ottoman title used after the names of certain provincial governors, high-ranking officials and military commanders. so long ago as the 18th July last. Gabriel Effendi made no direct
reply, but launched out into a somewhat bitter tirade against the action of the Russian
Ambassador in endeavouring, just at a moment when the Cabinet was surrounded with
difficulties of every kind, to force on them proposals the acceptance of which would
necessarily expose them to the reproach of having yielded to menace, and so weaken
their position before the country. I suggested to his Excellency that there was nothing
in the Russian proposals that could be considered inacceptable, as they amounted
merely to a return to the status quo which Turkey had bound herself to respect by the
convention of 1869, and which she had been constantly violating on the flimsiest
pretexts for the past five years, and I suggested that if his Excellency would instruct
the Turkish delegates to accept the line suggested by Russia, M. de Giers’s demarche
need never be known to the public at all. I thought that this was the wisest course to
take, and urged his Excellency to give it his best consideration. I think that my
remarks made some impression on the Minister, but it was quite clear that his Excellency
had been very much irritated, not so much, it seemed to me, by the substance of the
communication, as by something that M. de Giers had said to him at the time of urging
it on him—a circumstance which somewhat surprised me, as the Ambassador had told
me that he intended to use very friendly, if insistent, language in pressing his
proposals.
As regards our own proposals for the frontier in the neighbourhood of Mohammerah,
Gabriel Effendi expressed himself as anxious to meet our wishes, and in thanking him
I again urged on him the advisability of showing a similar conciliatory disposition
towards Russia.
On my return to Therapia I received a visit from M. de Giers, to whom I related
my conversation with Gabriel Effendi. The Ambassador said that Gabriel Effendi s
annoyance was probably caused by the very strong language he had felt bound to use
in protesting against the recent dispatch of seventy Turkish soldiers to Urmia, which
he had described to the Minister for Foreign Affairs as a deliberate act of provocation
and calculated to lead to regrettable incidents with the Russian force in the town.
M. de Giers admitted, however, that he was encountering more difficulty than he had
expected in inducing the Turks to accept the Russian line in the north, and he foresaw
that some tangible inducement would have to be held out to them. He was therefore
anxious that we should examine what territorial arrangement m favour of Turkey
could be proposed, and draw up suggestions for submission to our Governments with_as
little delay as possible, so that he might be m a position to urge on the lurkish
Government that, in agreeing to accept the Russian line, they would be obtaining
a territorial quid pro quo which would be of use to silence the cuticism of then political
enemies. I hinted to his Excellency that, although from a legal point of view the case
for the Russian Jine might be as strong as, or even stronger than, our case for the
Mohammerah—Howizah line, he would have the harder task m reaching an agreement
with the Turks, as the recognition of the frontier desired by Russia involved the
withdrawal of Turkish troops from the occupied districts. lo this M. de Giers assented
readily enough, and added that he was about to ask his Government to permit him to
hold forth to the Turks as an additional inducement the consent of Russia to the
application of the new Temettu Law and to the 4 p(|r” cent. .Tpcrehse o^hq customs
duties - I have, Ac. 20 SEP 1912
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