Settlement of the Opposing Claims of Persia and Afghanistan to Seistan [‎435r] (17/54)

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Seistan south of the Helmund which she claims ’’ the half ° f
Mr. Ahson telegraphed that “Persia agrees that an English and Persian
Mr. Alison, No. 36 of 24th July i87o. Commissioner should proceed to Seistan to inspect
sions and return here with it. Great“sdlin Zld thefarbSate'onlheprin:
(InMr. Thomson’s No. 42 of 22nd April 1870.) ci pl e laid down in the Persian memorandum nf
April 19th.
Juf;^ 6 iaMr - Alis0n ’ s No ‘ 38 ° f 25th , Th f ^egram was founded on a memoran
dum from Mirza Saeed Khan to this effect:
Lord Clarendon replied that “Colonel Goldsmid will proceed at once to
Lord Clarendon, No. 54 of 2Sth July i87o. Teheran. Persian Commssioner will be ready to
, . , , set out with him to Seistan frontier whero
notice will have been given to the Afghan Commissioner to meet them. When the
three are together it wdl be for the Persian and Afghan Commissioners, respectively
to state and substantiate their claims, and if local enquiry is necessary, they ma(
proceed to any point and take a map of any districts; the two Commissioner! will
len set foith the conclusions which they maintain, and Colonel Goldsmid havino-
weighed the evidence will submit an arbitral opinion to the Persian and Afghan
uovernments. b
hen this document was communicated to the Persian Government, they
Mr. Alison, No. 39 of 2nd August i87o. began by raising serious objections to the presence
. of an Afghan Commissioner at the enquiries con
nected with the Seistan arbitration, affecting altogether to misunderstand the
nature of the agreement they had entered into on the subject, and pretending that
they had only consented to come to terms with Her Majesty’s Government alone
as to the extent of their rights in Seistan.
Mr. Alison gave the Persian Government to understand that to break off
negociations at this point would not tend to avert the danger they so much appre
hended of an attack on the part of the Afghans, and with much difficulty,
and chiefly by means of this argument, induced them to consent to the
presence of the Afghan Commissioner.
On the 14th of September, Mirza Maasum Khan, a nephew of the Minister for
No. 40 (telegram) of loth August 1870 Foreign Affairs, and formerly Secretary of Legation
at St. Petersburg and Consul at Astrakau, was
appointed Persian Commissioner.
General Goldsmid’s instructions from 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. begin by reciting briefly
Enclosure 2, in Lord Granville, No. 58 of the facts connected with the present condition
nth August i87o. 0 f the Seistan question.
The claim of the Persian Government, based upon the 6th article of the Treaty
of Paris, which implies that resort may be had to arms if the friendly offices of
• (Approved of by sir Charles Wood.) J* 61 ' Ma j est y’ s Government fail of effect and upon
the passage in Lord Kussell s letter* of jNovem-
ber 1863, which says that u Her Majesty’s Government being informed that the
title to the territory of Seistan is disputed between Persia and xifghanistan, must
decline to interfere in the matter, and must leave it to both parties to make good
their claim by force of arms” is disposed of in the following manner:
“ It is unquestionable that this letter relieved Persia for the time from any
pre-existing obligation not to take up arms against the Afghans for the recovery of
Seistan without a previous .resort to the good offices of Her Majesty’s Government.
Put this temporary release was understood to relate to the particular events then in
course of development, not to convey an unlimited sanction for the extension
of Persian territory to the Eastward in all time to come. Moreover, you will bear
in mind that the permission given in Lord Pussell s letter to resort to hostilities did
not necessarily include any recognition on the part of the British Government of
the conquests on one side or the other resulting from such hostilities, and it does
not follow, therefore, that we are bound in our capacity of arbitrators to admit the
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