Page 132 - Historical Summaries (Persian Gulf) 1907-1953

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Tbo Government of India have also from time
to time recommended—
(1.) That the "French Government should ho
approached with a view to their being induced
to agreo to the total prohibition of the arms
traffic at Muscat; and
(2.) That the Porte should ho asked to agree to
our patrolling the Turkish littoral against arms
smugglers, or at least to declare the illegality of
tho traffic.

Neither of these suggestions has hitherto Government of
borne fruit. Tho question was passed in review India’s letter of
February 21, 1907.
by tho Government of India as recently as
February 1907, and the conclusion at which
thoy arrived, after a careful and detailed ex­
amination of the case, was that the arms traffic
would continue to flourish aud increase until an
Agreement with Franco was arrived at, and a
complete prohibition was enforced against the
importation of arms and ammunition into the
territories of the Sultan of Muscat. The whole
question will come up for discussion at the forth­
coming International Conference at Brussels.
Under the Brussels Act of 1890 for regulating
the traffic in arms, anyone of the Signatory Powers
that has occasion to authorize such traffic in
territories of its own lying within the region
affected by the provisions of the Act, is required
to establish a “ public warehouse,” under the
control of its local Administration, in which all
imported arms must be deposited, and from
which they may not bo withdrawn without the
previous authorization of the Administration.
There seems no hope of obtaining the consent
of France, and the other Powers having Treaty
relations with Muscat, to the Sultan’s prohibiting,
proprio motu, the import of arras into his
dominions. The only remedy for the present
evil would, therefore, appear to be to bring
Muscat, at the forthcoming Conference, within
the scope of the Brussels Act of 1890, and to
enforce there the provisions requiring the
establishment of a warehouse under proper
supervision.
If this is done, two questions will arise:—
(a.) What inducement shall be offered to the
Sultan, a Sovereign whose independence has
been guaranteed by Great Britain and France, to
accept restrictions on a traffic amounting to