GERMAN DESIGN ON PERSIA.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume L, Issue 59, 1 June 1907, Page 3

GERMAN DESIGN ON PERSIA.

Berlin, April i. Germain: in need of new fields of expansion, lias marked down Persia as a favorable country /or exploitation, and elaborate plans have limi worked out lor ilio promotion of German commercial interests and (he extension of German enterprise iu 111? Sliali's dominions. Tho plans aiv. I unik'i'sland, on ahsnlately reliable information, to lie earned out liy the German Government, in spite of the fact that every step forward contemplated by tlie Germans involves an invasion of tlio recognised sphere of British inlluenee and ail attack on British interests in Persia. Herman enterprise in Persia thus promises to bring about a critical situation in the '.Middle East, besides increasing the tension between (heat Britain and (icrinany already existing in Europe. Germany's schemes for exploiting Persia are so menacing to British interests that they merit serious attention on the part of llis Majesty's Government. Hitherto Ureal Britain and Russia have been the only powers with extensive inliueiH" in Teheran, North Persia has been recognised as the Russian spline of inlluenee. and South Persia as tiie British. The Anglo-Russian agreement, now practically concluded, provides for the removal of future causes of rivalry in Persia. IX THE BRITISH SPHERE.

This arrangement between Ureal Britain and Russia is extremely distasteful to Germany, who desires to further her own ends in "Persia. It is significant, however, that the commercial development now beginning is to be confined to South Persia, and carefully excluded from Xorlh Persia.

In plain words, this means that the German Government is willing to patronise an invasion by German merchants of the British sphere of influence while carefully avoiding any action that could give offence to Russia. German protestations of friendship for England cannot conceal the fact that the scheme now begun in Persia with the consent and knowledge of the German Government is an effort to gain a footing in a. country adjacent to Britain's Indian Empire. An eminent authority on the Middle Eastern question has put it on record that the presence of any military Power in South Persia would be a potential menace to India. Viewed in this light, the German commercial invasion appears still more menacing.

The German Orient Bank was founded more than a year ago to promote profitable enterprises in- Eastern countries. Its own capital amounts to £BOO,OOO, and its founders and backers are three of the most powerful institutions in Germany—the Dresdner Bank, the National Bank of Germany, and the Scliaffhausen Banking Association. One of its directors, Herr Gutmann, junior, is now at Teheran to begin •'practical business operations in Persia.

The plan of campaign has been carefully worked out, and begins with the establishment of a German Bank at Teheran to compete with the.British and Eusconcessions. * COMMERCIAL CENTRE. The German Orient Bank will also try' to establish a great 'commercial centre at the most favoi able port on the Persian Gulf, obtaining a concession of territory as the site of the necessary buildings. This would be the headquarters of a new German line of coasting steamships to distribute to all the Person ports the German exports brought to the chos,m commercial centre by the Ham-burg-American and other German lines. The steamships of the Hamburg-Ame-rican Company now plying in the Persian Gulf undercut their British competitors by charging 8s a ton of freight as compared with 12s a ton rate of the British ships, and it is expected that a continuance of this policy will drive the British Hag out of the Gulf.

Ah audacious scheme of railway construction, seriously encroaching on British rights, completes the project of the German Orient Bank. It is stated that one of these projected German railways, running from Teheran to Bagdad, would earn profits simply by conveying the corpses of pious Persians to two holy places southward of Bagdad, where the Persian Moslems desire to be buried. Another projected railway, running from Bagdad eastward and then southward to the new German commercial centre on the Persian Gulf, would provide the urgently needed terminus for the Bagdad railway.

The German Government recently appointed a new Minister at Teheran,'Herr Stemrich, an expert in Oriental affairs, to promote German commercial interests in Peisia. One of Ilerr Stcmrich's first acts was to recommend au immediate extension of German enterprise.