File 1341/1921 Pt 1 'Khorassan Intelligence Summaries 1921-1922' [‎322v] (292/1080)

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the excess of movement east over west being due to the transport of petroleum
which has increased in volume again recently.
iSarakhs .—J anuary 12th.
89. .Raiding of live stock continues. Karim Khan Baloch brought % i
camels from Afghan territory on the 3rd and handed them over to rhe
Bolsheviks.
40. His men looted three flocks of sheep from Paraman in the Turbat-i-
Sheikh Jam district (Persia) on the 3rd January and on the 7th two more
flocks the property of Haji Muhammad Aqa Afshar of Meshedi.
41. The attack on Vakil Elected representative or attorney, acting in legal matters such as contracting marriage, inheritance, or business; a high-ranking legal official; could also refer to a custodian or administrator. Bazar is confirmed„ The raiders were mounted
and numbered 40. Pour men in the Bazar were shot dead, the remainder fled,
The raiders who were Arsari Turkmen from Afghan territory collected the
contents of the bazar and made off. The Bolsheviks sent a pursuing force of
60 and two machine guns after them but too late to be of any use.
42. The Bolsheviks wish to connect their telegraph line at Sarakhs to that
at Persian Sarakhs in order to work through to Meshed. Sanction was refused
by the Persian Governor pending instructions from Meshed.
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TRANS-PRONTIER.
43. Transcaspia. —There is no change in the general situation. The
affair at Bazar Vakil Elected representative or attorney, acting in legal matters such as contracting marriage, inheritance, or business; a high-ranking legal official; could also refer to a custodian or administrator. , elsewhere noted, was possibly only a raid for
the sake of plunder and does not denote an extension of the Basmach
movement so far west, although the raiders are given that generic title. It
will belinteresting to see if the Bolsheviks demand an explanation of the
Afghan Government.
44. The threat by the Persian Government of an expedition against its
domiciled Turkmen tribes, the Goklans and Yomuds, has caused a recrudescence
of the traffic in arms and wheat. This has eased the food situation somewhat
at Kizil Arvat which is on the direct road to Russia from the tribal country on
the Atrek, at Gumbad-i-Qabus, and in the Astarabad province.
45. The ration of the workmen remaining in the railway dep6t is only 25
pounds of flour a month and four small dried fish weekly hence the alleviation
due to the Yomud attack on furgons on the Meshed-Tehran road reacts
favourably on the inhabitants of Kizil Arvat. “ 111 blows the wind that pro-
fiteth nobody.” i
46. Khiva —The absence of all reference in the Bolshevik press to the
Khorezm Republic continues. According to a traveller from Petroalexand- I
rovsk there is no warfare in Khiva and, with the exception of spamodic
affairs with Yomuds, the country is quiet. General conditions are the same ,
as elsewhere, that is, starvation, want of clothing, and crowds of famine
refugees who die by scores.
47. Turkestan. —Pamine relief, popularly ascribed to America, is begin
ning to find a way to centres in Turkestan, such relief taking the form of
food, drugs, and cloth. Troops in certain garrisons are reported to be clad
in new woollen cloth and the surmise is perhaps natural “ How much of this
has been subscribed for by the charitable for the relief of the really destitute
jn Russia ?”
48. According to one who was working on the railway at Tashkent, the
wireless station has been shifted from the Kew to the Old Town. Although
there is nothing impossible in such an operation it would be one of some
magnitude and, unless there is a stand-by set, service would be interrupted.
The report is, therefore, discredited for the present-
49. The railway shops in Tashkent are now employing only about 200
men. The bomb and rifle factory An East India Company trading post. has stopped work and, with the exception
of one steam flour mill, all factories and mills are idle.
50. In Tashkent and other towns in Turkestan the dearth of h 16 -
has caused an alteration in the system of rationing. Or rather,
there is no dearth of fuel for in the country north of Tasbken
there are thousands of acres of <f saksaul.” It is the dearth of labour,
organization, and transport which prevents this fuel getting t° £