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addition to the list of possible candidates to replace Belgrave (according to a

conversation between Kirkpatrick and Lloyd), the former informed the Foreign

Secretary of the Residency’s recommendation to promote GWR Smith, the Director

of Customs, who had worked as acting Adviser during Belgrave’s absence on leave,

to succeed him and take up some of his duties. 659

In Egypt, in a move that would further alienate Nasser from the West, the

Egyptian leader announced his country’s recognition of communist China on 16

May. 660 Nutting considered the move by Nasser as a response to the fear that an

arms embargo might be placed on the Middle East by the Western powers. 661 Also

in Egypt Al-Bakir met again with Audsley for the second time in the third week of

May. The nationalist informed Audsley that the demand to remove Belgrave from

power was ‘unalterable’. The Secretary of the NUC produced a telegram to the

British official from members of his Party in Bahrain that proposed the

announcement of a general strike with an undisclosed time period with another

demand for Belgrave’s removal. Al-Bakir claimed to have opposed taking such

measures, but its purpose was to inform the British that the NUC was capable of its

execution. As for Al-Sanhouri, Al-Bakir believed his delay in travelling to Bahrain to

work on editing the Penal Code was due to the expert’s connections with the former

regime of King Farouk. Al-Sadat saw him to be the best selection to take on the

responsibility of rewriting the code but, Al Bakir said, the choice was not favoured

by Nasser. The Bahraini nationalist believed that Al-Sanhouri would not be allowed

659 TNA, FO 371/120549, I. Kirkpatrick Minutes, 22 May 1956.
660 ‘Setbacks to U.S. Policy on China’, The Times, 18 May 1956, 10.
661 Nutting, Nasser, 138.

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