مجموعة ٣٠/٩٠ "المطالبة الفارسية بجزيرة البحرين" [و‎‎٥‎٠‎٩] (١٠٦٢/١٠٣٠)

c est au sujet de ce principe qne le Gonvernement
Abdol Aziz-Ebn-Seoud en mai 1927.
, 0 est pom ces considerations qne le Gouvernement imperial a proteste et
dJA*] m amtient sa protestation centre Particle 6 du Traite de Dieddah dn 20 mai
1927, relatit anx lies de Bahrein.
Mon Gouvernement espere qne le Gonvernement de Sa Majeste britannique se
rendra aux considerations historiques et juridiques ci-dessus invoquees et qu’il
reconnaitra volontiers qu’une telle disposition ne pent avoir d’effet que si elle a
ete conclue avec 1’Etat persan, Souverain legitime des lies de Bahrein.
Veuillez, &c.
F. PAKREVAN.
[E 853/33/91]
(D)
Sir Austen Chamberlain to Hovhannes Khan Mossaed,
Foreign Office, February 18, 1929.
Sir,
IN a note dated the 18th January, 1928, I had the honour to inform you, in
reply to your note of the 26th November, 1927, respecting the claim advanced by
your Government to the islands of Bahrein, that His Majesty’s Government in the
United Kingdom were not aware of any valid grounds upon which the claim of
the Persian Government to sovereignty over those islands was or could be based.
Some months later, on the 2nd August, 1928, the Persian Acting Minister for
Foreign Affairs addressed to His Majesty’s Charge d’Affaires at Tehran a further
note explaining in detail the reasons which have led his Government to consider
themselves justified in advancing such a claim. I now have the honour to request
that you will convey to your Government the following reply :—
2. His Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom have examined with
the greatest care the views set forth in the Persian Government’s note of the
2nd August, and have endeavoured to extract from the many unsupported
declarations that Bahrein forms an integral part of Persia (a statement which,
as I have already indicated in my note under reference, bears no relation to
geographical facts), the essential arguments on which this claim is based. They
note that the Persian Government do not in any way base their claim on the
alleged recognition of their rights in the past by His Majesty’s Government. So
far as can be deduced from their note under reply, their claim is, in fact, founded
on three main arguments : Firstly, on uninterrupted possession except for the
period of Portuguese occupation between 1507 and 1622; secondly, on an alleged
principle of international law that a territory belonging to a sovereign State
cannot be lawfully detached so long as its annexation by another State or its
independence have not been officially recognised by the lawful owner of the
territory; and thirdly, on documents of a date later than the end of the
18th century, in which the sheikhs of the islands are alleged to have declared
their submission to the Persian Government, and on the alleged payment by them
of tribute to the Persian Government. After full examination of these arguments
His Majesty’s Government have reached the conclusion, for the reasons given
below, that they entirely fail to substantiate a Persian claim to sovereignty ovei
the islands at the present day.
3. In the first place, the statement that “Bahrein has always and
uninterruptedly formed part of Persia in past centuries, except during the
Portuguese occupation from 1507 to 1622 ” is not one which can be allowed to
pass unquestioned. I have already drawn attention to the evident tact that
geographically this, assertion is misleading. Historically it is almost equa }
misleading. The earlier history of the islands before 1507 is obscure, but it cannot
seriously be maintained that they were subject to Persian sovereignty all thioug
the Arab, Mongol and Tartar invasions and the anarchy of the Middle Ages _ Un
the contrary, modern historians have expressed the opinion that ±rom the o