Page 144 - The Arabian Gulf States_Neat

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i 82 Till- LEGAL STATUS OF THE ARABIAN GULF STATES
M more
i advanced beyond the tribal stage’, and it presupposes a formerly
‘established government which can agree and accept the protection’.1
The Federated and Unfederated States of Malay were regarded ‘as
the most important examples of protected States’. In their treaties
with the British Government the rulers of the Malay Slates agreed
to accept the advice of a British Resident ‘in all questions other"than
those touching Malay religion and customs’.2 Under the Federation
Agreement of 1948, Britain had ‘complete control, including powers
of legislation, of the defence and the external affairs of the Federation
and of Johorc’.3
The Princely States of India were also, prior to the coming into force
of the India Act of 15 August 1947, referred to as protected States.
The British relations with those States were established as a result of
; treaties of alliances and protection signed with their rulers. Theoretic­
ally, the rulers surrendered to the Crown their external sovereignty
•1 but reserved their internal autonomy. In practice, however, the rights
. of the Crown in the Indian States were defined not on the basis of
the treaties alone, but also ‘on the conception known as Paramountcy’,
which meant ‘the powers and obligations assumed or acquired by the
■
Crown as it became the dominant, and ultimately the supreme, power
in India’.4 The right of the Crown as the ‘Paramount Power’ was
again affirmed by the British Government in the Report of the Indian
States Committee of 1928 to 1929.5
In connection with the Gulf Slates, the first official reference to them
as ‘British Protected States’ was contained in The British Protector­
ates, Protected States and Protected Persons Order in Council, 1949.°
For the purposes of this Order, the ‘Persian Gulf States’ (the Shaikh-
doms) were, together with the States of Malay, Tonga and the
Maidive Islands, classified in the Second Schedule as ‘British Protected
States’. The First Schedule of the Order named ad the African terri­
tories under British protection, including the Aden Protectorate and
Zanzibar, as Protectorates.7 Now, after the independence of these
1 Robbins, R., ‘The Legal Status of Aden Colony and Aden Protectorate’,
A.J.I.L., 33 (1939), pp. 713-14.
2 Stewart, op. cit., p. 26. For former status, sec Baty, B.Y.I.L., op. cit., p. 109.
3Oppenheim, 196, n. (3). For the Federation Agreement of 21 January 1948,
sec S.I. 1948, No. 108. ’
4 Sec Westlake, pp. 41-3; Lec-Warner, Sir W., The Native States of India (1910),
pp. 37-40; Somervell, D. B., ‘The Indian States’, B.Y.I.L., 11 (1930), pp. 58-60;
6 Sec Somervell, op. cit., pp. 58-9; Publication of the Government of Hydera­
bad, The Complaint of Hyderabad against the Dominion of India (under Article
35 (2) of the U.N. Charter) (1948) pp. 29-32.
4 S.I. (1949) No. 140.
7 The Aden Protectorate, unlike the Shaikhdoms, is regarded as a protectorate
of the colonial type. According to Robbins, the Aden Protectorate has no inter­
national personality, and British treaties with the rulers of the Protectorate are