File 930/1912 'Mohammerah - Khoremabad Railway' [‎163r] (332/396)

31
of the joint advance had reached his Government in
Sir E. Grey’s Despatch No. 67, 22nd a garbled form. As regards the conditions relating
March 1910. f° railways, the following is an extract from a
i(P. 257.) despatch addressed by Sir E. Grey to His Majesty’s
Pol. 3212/10. Ambassador in Berlin : —
“ Count Metternich remarked upon our option
“ upon railway concessions, saying that it seemed
“ to exclude all foreign enterprise.
“ I replied that this was not the intention of the
“ condition. As a matter of fact, we had no great
(P. 257.) “ desire to make railways ourselves in Persia at the
“moment, but we wished to guard against the
“ possibility of waking up some morning to find
“ that the Persians had placed some railway con-
“ cessions under foreign control for making railways
“ where they would be damaging to our political
“ interests, or strategically menacing to our fron-
“ tiers. We desired, therefore, to have the option
“ of making railways of this sort ourselves, and so
“ rendering them unobjectionable, if the Persians
“ decided to have them made by foreigners.”
From this time onward the question of Persian
railways becomes closely connected with that of the
Bagdad Railway, and, therefore, also with German
interests. It is not here proposed to enter fully
into this larger question, it will be sufficient to
refer briefly to the main issues, so far as they affect
the discussion of Persian railways.
Anglo Russian Notes of 7th April
and 20th May 1910 as to Concessions in
Persia.
Sir G. Barclay’s Despatch No. 50, 8 th
April 1910.
(P. 132.)
Pol. 3437/10.
(P. 133.)
Mr. Marline’s Despatch No. 80, dated
20th May 1910.
(P. 2' 7 3).
Pol. 3520/10.
35. The negotiations referred to in the pre
ceding paragraph for a joint Anglo-Russian
advance made little progress, and the Persian
Government seemed likely instead to borrow from
other sources. In a Joint Anglo-Russian Note,
dated the 7th April 1910, they were informed
of the conditions on which the two Governments
would assent to such borrowing, and the Note
concluded in the following way
“ En outre, nous avons Phonneur de vous faire
“ savoir que b Angleterre et la Russie, tout en ne
“ pas entravant les droits des nationaux d’autres
“ Puissances aux enterprises purement commer-
“ ciales en Perse, ne peuvent en aucun cas admettre
“ qu’il soit accorde aux nationaux d’autres Puis-
“ sances etrangeres des concessions qui puissent
“ porter atteinte a leurs interets politiques ou
“ strategiques en Perse.”
In a Note dated the 7th May 1910, the Persian
Government took exception to the ambiguity of this
passage and asked for an explanation of the word
“concessions.” In a further Joint Note, dated the
20th May 1910, they were informed as follows : —
“ Vu la difficulte de specifier les concessions
“ qui pourraient porter atteinte a leurs interets
“ politiques ou strategiques, les deux Puissances
“ s’attend ent a ce qu’avant de dehvrer des con-
“ cessions quelconques de voies de communication,
“ de telegraphes et de ports a un sujet etranger, le
“ Gouvernement persan entre dans un echange de
D 4
(P. 274.)