'File No. II/12 Foreign Dept Memoranda of Information re: affairs in Persia and Arabian shore of the Persian Gulf. Jan '09 --' [‎40r] (79/178)

9
3?*
7. M. Mornard, of the Persian Customs,
Grant of permission Wh .° is sported to have
to M. Mornard to resigned his post, has
rjushki route. , een granted permis
sion to travel to India
by the Nushki trade route.
8. {Vide paragraph 8 of the Memo^
Exchange of tele- ravdum for March
graph lines in Persia. 1909 \ In renlv tn hia
Proposed erection of ' in 10
a second wire from telegram, dated the
Tehran to shahrud. 2 4tii February 1909,
Sir A. Nicolson was instructed by His
Majesty’s Government on the 5th March 1909
that, in the event of the Russian Government
pressing the point of the method of procedure
to be adopted at Tehran with regard to the
exchange of control of the Tehran-Meshed and
Khaf-Seistan Telegraph lines, they should be
informed that, while His Majesty’s Govern
ment entirely share the desire of the Russian
Government for the speedy settlement of the
exchange of control of the lines, they consider
that tiie Persian Government are more likely to
waive their objections to this exchange if they
have first been well disposed by the financial
advantages arising from the transfer to the
British Government of control over the
Arabistan line. With regard to his suggestion
that the Russian Government would probably
raise objections to the employment of British
signallers on the telegraph lines from Shahrud
and Meshed to the frontier, Sir A. Nicolson
was told that there was no need for him to
raise the question.
On the 9th March, His Majesty’s Minister
at Tehran suggested that, if the construction of
a second line to Shahrud was pressed for by the
Persian Minister of Telegraphs, it would be
well that authority should be given to the Indo-
European Telegraph Department to under
take the preliminary work (which might be
abandoned by degrees when the telegraph
negotiations were completed), as the negotia
tions, which were being hastened as much as
possible in Persia, might be jeopardised by a
direct refusal. On the 17th March, Sir A.
Nicolson was instructed to explain the situa
tion to the Russian Government, and to ask
them if they wished the preliminary work to be
undertaken by the Indo-European Telegraph
Department.
9. (Vide paragraph 5 of the Memo-
State of the Tehran- randum for March
Meshed telegraph line. 1909) On the 10th
February 1909, His Britannic Majesty’s
Minister, Tehran, drew the attention of the
Russian Minister to the report that the usual
repairs to the Khaf-Seistan telegraph line had
not been executed during the past year, al
though the Tehran-Meshed line, the control
of which it was intended should be handed
over to Russia in exchange for that of the