BAHREIN ISLANDS

Dominion, Volume 21, Issue 131, 2 March 1928, Page 9

BAHREIN ISLANDS

PERSIAN CLAIM DENIED BRITISH NOTE PUBLISHED Rugby, February 29. A copy of. a Note addressed to the Persian Minister in London by the Foreign Secretary (Sir Austen Chamberlain), on the subject of the Bahrein Islands was communicated to the League of Nations to-day. The Note is a reply to the Persian Government’s protest of November last against the terms of Article 6 of the Treaty of Jeddah, concluded in May, 1927, with the King of Hejaz and Nejd, on the ground that the reference in that Article to the Islands of Behrein is contrary to the territorial integrity of Persia. Persian Claim Untenable. The Note states that the British Government is not aware of any valid grounds upon which the claim of the Persian Government to sovereignty over these islands is or can be based. Geographically the islands are not part of Persia, nor are the inhabitants of the Persian race. The British Government is aware that during part of the seventeenth century and for some years during the latter part of the eighteenth century, Bahrein was overrun and occupied by Persian troops or by followers of certain chiefs from the eastern shores of the Persian Gulf, but it appears to be established that in or about the vear 1783 the Government of the Shah was dispossessed of the islands by an invasion- of Arab tribes under the leadership of the direct lineal ancestor of the present Sheik, and that since that date the islands have never at any time been under the effective control of Persia. The Note declares that the Persian allegation that their claim to sovereignty over Bahrein has been recognised on various occasions is entirely inadmissible. Claims Never Admitted. Concluding, the Note says: “From the foregoing remarks you will observe that the British Government neither in 1869 nor at any other time intended to recognise that Bahrein was part of Persia, and that while it has, indeed, admitted that the claim on the subject has from time to time been put forward by the Persian Government, it has never admitted the validity of such claims by the Turkish or Persian Governments. Its consistent endeavour in the matter of Bahrein has been to secure that the peaceful development of the islands and the welfare of the Arab inhabitants shall not be disturbed by unjustified attempts on the part of their neighbours to subject them to foreign domination. They are not prepared to contemplate any departure from this policy.”—British Official Wireless.