File 345/1908 Pt 1 'Mohammerah: situation. British assurances to Sheikh.' [‎158r] (320/416)

their despatch of the 21 st February, 1007. “We regard it as certain,” they wrote,
“that effective action for the suppression of the arms trade cannot be taken by the
Persian authorities. On the coast, the Belgian Customs officials are few in number,
and although, perhaps, willing to give assistance for the suppressiorf of the traffic,
they have not the means at their disposal really to take efficient measures to deal
with the evil. Inland, as is well known, the Persian authorities are powerless outside
the towns, and large caravans can travel by unfrequented routes without the slightest
risk of interference.”
Govern
ment of
India’s
letter of
February
21 , 1907 .
W.—Quarantine,
(Communicated by the India Office The department of the British Government to which the Government of India reported between 1858 and 1947. The successor to the Court of Directors. .)
A.
“The sanitary defence of the Persian Gulf The historical term used to describe the body of water between the Arabian Peninsula and Iran. ,” wrote Dr. Theodore Thomson in his
Report of the 12th July, 1906, “has in the past received, and still continues to
receive, considerable attention, not only in the interests of countries adjacent thereto,
hut also because it is maintained by some authorities that cholera and plague are
particularly likely to invade these regions by reason of their nearness to, and
frequent communication with, India, and thence to extend over-land to Europe.
This view was voiced by M. Barr&re, one of the French Delegates at the Inter
national Sanitary Conference of 1897, when he classified the Persian Gulf The historical term used to describe the body of water between the Arabian Peninsula and Iran. , along
with the Bed Sea, as the ‘ routes naturelles des maladies pestifentielles.’ In relation
with this aspect of the matter the question of what measures should be adopted with
a view to guarding against the suggested danger to Europe was discussed at the
International Sanitary Conferences of 1891, 1897, and 1903; and in each of the Con
ventions drawn up at these Conferences clauses were incorporated embodying
measures intended to secure this end.”
Stated briefly, the Begulations framed under the Paris Convention of 1894,
which had special reference to cholera, have in the main been a dead letter. The
Regulations contemplated the establishment of a number of sanitary stations, under
the control of the Turkish authorities, in the Persian Gulf The historical term used to describe the body of water between the Arabian Peninsula and Iran. , and the enforcement of
quarantine against arrivals. The British Government, in adhering to the Convention,
refused to accept the Appendix containing the Persian Gulf The historical term used to describe the body of water between the Arabian Peninsula and Iran. Begulations, on the
grounds (1) that the posts were unnecessary; (2) that Turkey and Persia were too
far off to maintain effective control; and ( 3 ) that the great expense entailed m
establishing the ports would fall chiefly on British shipping, which formed 98 pei
cent, of the shipping in the Gulf. The scheme was not carried out.
When plague appeared in India in 1896 the Constantinople Board of Health
discussed at great length and on repeated occasions the question of new ports and t ic
regime to he applied in the Gulf ports. It was ultimately decided to establish a
permanent port at Fao, and to repulse plague-infected ships from Bussorah. A om-
mission was sent to Fao to select a site, but nothing further was done, and H ao
remained a sanitary office with no lazaret and no sanitary apparatus. .
In the Venice Sanitary Convention of 1897 provision was made simply for a
sanitary station near Bussorah and another at or in the neighbourhood o ie s an
of Ormuz or of Kishm, near the entrance of the Gulf, these stations o e uncer
the control of the Constantinople Board of Health. r The establishment o le imuz
station was to be subject to an agreement between Turkey and Persia. e ^ .! an
authorities objected to the proposed station at Ormuz on political giouncs, 10 in r ,
that it would give the maritime control of the Persian Gulf The historical term used to describe the body of water between the Arabian Peninsula and Iran. to Turkey, anc mig i^
become a means of harassing British shipping. the proposals were, ovieyn,
accepted by the British Government, and Persia also ratified the Convention, subject
to the reservation that the station at the entrance of the Gulf shou c oe unc er
* This is a body of international composition, Great _ Britain being represented on it by
Clemow, Physician to His Majesty’s Embassy at Constantinople. Dr - ^' c Q ks °fT r , Ij+Wandinf/its nominal
Physician to the British Embassy, thus described the Board in January -898: 1 0 h* ufetended will
international character, the Board is in reality a Turkish Department, guided >y . always cou-
of the Sultan, and administered by its Turkish members; ” and the British ways ^ com
sistently maintained the view that the Board is not independent of the ur is ’
that the Porte is responsible for all measures adopted on its advice.