Page 135 - Records of Bahrain (7) (ii)_Neat

Saudi Arabia-Bahrain seabed boundary, 1951-1958 525

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ft lino southwards and that if in Uio papor handed to mo
at Uio Joddft talks King Sftud had meant south-oast rathor
tlmn south ho would no douht havo said so, but that
in fact 110 said southwards. As you aro av/aro tho basic
argument on this portion of tho frontier turns on our

wish to retain tho potontial oil-boaring structure for
Bahrain and tho Saudis* wish to obtain it for themselves.
As regards tho southern part of the lino and tho division
of tho Bainas Yusuf Yasin said after some discussion that
it v/as clear that tho problem was a mainly technical ono
as to whoro tho dividing lino could most conveniently bo
drawn, and ho said ho would refer tho various possibilities
to technical exports. Tho two proposals in tho field wore

the Saudi ono that tho northern island and its
territorial waters should belong to Saudi Arabia and tho
southern island and its territorial wators to Bahrain,
as shown on tho Saudi lino drawn on tho sketch map
roforred to above, and secondly Shaikh Salman's suggestion
doscribod in paragraph 7 above that each island and its
territorial wators should bo divided. As Shaikh Yusuf
appeared to see some difficulty in dividing in half such
small piocos of torritory and as it seenjed to mo that

in fact this is a slightly absurd idea in practice, I
throw out tho personal suggestion of a third altornativo,
that tho lino should bo drawn along the eastern edge of
tho northern Baina and along the western edgo of tho
southern island,i.e. giving each country tho whole of

ono island but only half its territorial wators. This
would koop tho lino more or loss straight as desired by
/Shaikh