Page 313 - UAE Truncal States_Neat

Chapter Eight

on the increase everywhere in the Gulf and soon became the primary
source of income for all the tribal settlements on the coast.
Culmination of the maritime peace policy in 1053
As the pearling industry flourished, new types of disputes between
the subscribers to the treaty became more prominent, such as
disputes over absconding debtors. Eventually the shaikhdoms of the
southern coast of the Gulf became so preoccupied with these
disputes that they all but ceased to play a significant role in the
regional power struggles.33 This inward-looking preoccupation with
the purely domestic Trucial Coast scene and its pearl banks was
further enhanced by the first Maritime Truce of 1835, an agreement
between the British authorities and the Rulers of Sharjah, Dubai,
'Ajman and Abu Dhabi. The truce was for one pearling season,
banning all hostilities at sea between 21 May and 21 November.
Similar treaties, initially covering a few months and later the entire
year, were concluded annually thereafter. In June 1843 a truce was
signed for a ten-year period; the prospect of undisturbed pearl
fishing year after year did much to stabilise relations between the
Qawasim and the Bani Yas, who as the leading proponents of the
Ghafiri and the Hinawi factions had carried out a series of raids on
land and had declared war against one another at sea. At the end of
this period the Government of India supported the proposal of the
Political Resident in Bushire, Captain A.B. Kemball, to make a
permanent truce. All the Rulers appear to have agreed spontaneously
to this, and they signed the Perpetual Treaty of Peace between 4 and 9
May 1853.

3 Growing British military and political
involvement

Anti-slavery treaties
The British Government of India, once so reluctant to commit itself to
binding responsibilities in the Gulf, itself generated during the
course of the 19th century a number of issues which required a more
comprehensive system of British political and military involvement
in the affairs of the littoral states of the Gulf. The first such issue,
which had nothing to do with the original aim of preventing
disturbances to trade and communications, was the slave trade.
288