Coll 28/39 ‘Persia: Printed Correspondence 1929-1936’ [‎343r] (696/1174)

that in Egypt and other countries it is often found that the examining magistrate
refuses to give a further period to the u parquet ” to continue their investiga
tions. Davar seemed very interested in this but said that no such provision
existed in Persia. No time limit was mentioned in the “ qarar ” or mandate
which the competent magistrate had to issue for the examination of the case.
He simply gave permission, within twenty-four hours of the arrest, for the
investigation to be carried on. Jalal had told him that in the Soviet Union there
was a rule that the investigation had to be completed in ten days ; if there was
such a rule it was unique. There was one great difference between the Persian
system and European systems in this matter ; viz., that in Persia the accused
persons were not allowed to have a lawyer to help them with their replies. This
was found to be better because a lawyer often ensured that a gnilty person ^ot
off ! A discussion then ensued concerning the frequency with which guilty
parties escaped punishment owing to legal flaws and unfair help from clever
advocates, Davar took the view that it.was more important to condemn guilty
persons than to give prisoners the benefit of the doubt. He cited the opinion of
certain Italian jurists to show that juries were a mistake and defeated the proper
ends of justice.
7. As for the arrests in general, Davar made a very lengthy statement.
To begin with, it was unfortunate that they had coincided with the Moscow
arrests of British engineers. Davar was prepared to admit that the police were
inclined to be too precipitate where suspicions of spying were involved. Persia,
as far as its judicial organisation was concerned, was really only a young country
with very little experience. There was no anti-British feeling. It was pressure
from other directions which made the Persians jumpy. If a man thinks he is
going to be fired at by an adversary who has what appears to be a revolver in his
pocket, and then sees the adversary put his hand into that pocket, he attacks
him at once without waiting to see whether the adversary is really only going
to pull out his handkerchief. 80 it was with Persia. There was a
psychological feeling of jumpiness. The memoirs of Agabekoff, and the published
statement of Loganovsky, showed to what lengths a certain power was prepared
to go.
8 . As for the prisoners, Davar had already given a full account of their
cases. In future he would be greatly obliged if in similar cases Mr. Trott would
ring him up direct so that he could get hold of the relevant dossier at once and
do what was necessary. If one waited for papers to come through the official
channels, much time was lost. Mr. Trott said he was delighted to hear this, and
the only reason whv this had not hitherto been done was that the Ministry of
Foreign Affairs had always said that we should not deal with other Depart
ments direct. .Davar said that that did pof apply to a reference to him in this
way ; of course, our official communications had all to go to the Minister for
Foreign Affairs.
9. Throughout the interview, which lasted about an hour and during which
Davar talked extremely rapidly, he gave Mr. Trott the impression that he was
doing his best to be very friendly indeed. 10 * 12
10. Parsons has now been released on bail, and Mr. Trott saw him yester
day. He was quite positive that he was never formally charged and was almost
sure that in the- course of a long interrogation by a senior police official no men
tion was made of the fact that he was suspected of being a spy. If there was
any reference to spying it was entirely incidental. When interrogated again on
the twenty-fourth day of his arrest, he was asked “ Have you ever been a spy
or not ? ”.
H Thus it appears certain that there was no formal “ arraignment ” as
contemplated’in Article 123 of the Code of Criminal Procedure quoted in my
despatch No. 227 of May 12th [Serial No. (58)]. As soon as I have ascertained
definitelv whether there is any other regulation bearing on the arraignment ”
and what the normal procedure is, I propose to revert to the matter. M<mn-
while. I have given the Ministry of Foreign Affairs clearly to understand that
in spite of Mr! Trott’s interview with Darar, I expect full written replies on all
the points which I have raised.
12. I am sending conies oP this despatch to the Foreign Secretary to the
Government of India (No. 106),
LcSWFD