Page 231 - PERSIAN 8 1931_1940_Neat

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until she is forced to come to terms, which means being incorporated in the
Kingdom of .Saudi Arabia as a vassal State.
(<?) In the meantime from his point of view the King is killing two birds
wuh one stone. Vor apart from continuing the slow process of starving
Kuwait, he is successfully preventing the Ajman, Mutair and Awazin tribes from
having any but secret intercourse with their mother city.
(d) Actually Bin Sand’s troubles in A sir and the movement to the Yemen
border of almost the whole fighting strength of his State, have caused a certain
amount oi slackening off in the blockade to become evident. The tribes recognise
that Bin Saud’s hands are full and that his whole mind and attention is fixed on
how to settle his differences with the astute Imam Yaliva. Thcv have become
bolder in consequence and more and more of his tribesmen liuvo been coming
up to Kuwait and getting back safely again with contraband.
(e) hi spite of heroic efforts on the part of Hamud al Bagaawi (the butcher)
Bin Saud’s blockade Officer on the frontier, there has been a definite deteriora.
tion in the measures of the King to keep trade from flowing from Kuwait.
(/) A new factor and one which may have far reaching reactions (if not
seen and checked by the King) has recently made itself apparent. In the past,
Bin Jiluwi, the Governor of Hasa, used to seize a large amount of the customs
and revenues of Hasa and divert it to his own personal use. Hence he was one of
the chief personages to benefit by the diverting of the trade of Kuwait through
Bahrain. ’Pi) assist in this lie has for years employed the House of Qusaibi to
propagand for him in Bahrain, and took full advantage of the fact that the
Bahrain Government were equally anxious to see Kuwait trade come through
their ports. Since, however, the King send Mohamcd al Tawil to act as his
Revenue and Customs Director in Hasa the latter has prevented Ibn Jiloui from
44 looting the till ”, so to speak, and the latter dissatisfied and angry is, it is
said, doing all he can to ruin Al Tawil with his master, and has even gone as far
(so the rumour says) as to secretly order Al Bagaawi to ease off certain blockade
measures, so as to get more trade back to Kuwait and cause the customs receipts
of Bin Saud’s ports to show a falling off. This of course is all to the good (if
true). !
On the 15th June the Shaikh received a letter from Bin Saud in which he
was asked to raise his “ Customs ” to the figures (70 per cent, to 100 per cent.
ad valorem) in force at the King’s ports of Qatif, Jubail and O.jair, Bin Saud
for his part promising to remove all blockade restrictions in the interior.
The King ignored the fact that the very existence of Kuwait depends almost
entirely on her'transit trade with the interior.
(jl) The Shaikh while politely refusing to consider the King’s suggestions,
replied offering to accept the 14 manifest ” system with 44 Customs Posts ” along
the frontier, where manifests would be presented and checked. In other words
the system which the King himself proposed for Kuwait in 1930.
(/t) The King never replied to this counter offer.-
VII.—Relations with ’Iraq.
(a) These have been outwardly cordial and officially correct throughout
1933 and would continue to be so,.were it. not for the unfortunate underground
tension existing between the two Stales, which differs little from that existing
between Kuwait and Saudi Arabia.
This tension was further increased by the following- incidents which took
place during the year
(a) The Shaikh’s rights to his Bashiyah and Faddaghiyah Fstates were
contested by claimants who were considered by the Shaikh to have
been instigated by the ’Iraq Government.
(h) A demand on the part of the ’Iraq Government that the Shaikh’s
date gardens at Fao hitherto exempt should pay taxes and export
duty including produce intended for his own household use. Those
taxes and duty were actually taken from the Shaikh.
fr) The ’Iran Government put obstacles in the way of, and levied fees
v ; 111)0ri> Kuwait water boats which bring drinking water for the Town
from the Sliatt al Aral).