DEAD SEA MINERALS

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XVII, 7 December 1927, Page 7

DEAD SEA MINERALS

GRANTING OF CONCESSIONS. MORE QUESTIONS ASKED. [British Official Wireless.] Rugby, Dec. 6. Questions were again asked in the House of Commons regarding the concessions for Dead Sea minerals. Mr. W. Ormsby-Gore said negotiations were proceeding on behalf of the Palestinian and Transjordanian Governments, with a view to safegardiug the interests of those Governments in any concessions which would be granted. The question of possible relations with the German monopoly would be borne m mind. He would like to point out that there had been so much exaggeration as to the deposits. that he must enter a word of caution with regard to the salts. They were not only potash. The Transjordanian Government was the Government ot a mandated territory and its life had to be preserved. He understood the theory was that the frontier between Palestine and Transjordania ran somewhere down the middle of the Dead Sea.

Asked whether negotiations for the concession had been undertaken with Mr. Novomeyskyl or Major Tullock, Mr. Ormsby-Gore replied that negotitioiis were proceeding with tliese gentlemen jointly. Mr. Novomeysky was an engineer with local experience and also with experience in the separation of mineral salts by evaporation. He had for some time past been carrying out experiments on the shores of the Dead Seat