Page 345 - The Arabian Gulf States_Neat

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SUBMARINE BOUNDARIES 281
the coast would apply to them. In his Award in Petroleum Develop­
ment (TrueiaI Coast) Ltd v. Shaikh Abu Dhabi, 1951,1 Lord Asquith
defined the territorial sea of Abu Dhabi, for the purpose of the oil
concession agreement of 1939, as a belt of three miles in width.2 But
in recent oil concessions some Shaikhdoms have defined their terri­
torial seas as extending to six nautical miles from their coasts.3 And
in the 1951 revised concession of the Kuwait Oil Company the terri­
torial sea of Kuwait was fixed at six nautical miles.1
Both Iran and Saudi Arabia, the two principal coastal States on the
Gulf, have passed legislation defining the breadth of their territorial
seas. In the case of Iran, the first law of 19 July 19345 defined Iran's
territorial sea as extending to six nautical miles from the low-water
mark. But by a new law issued on 12 April 1959 Iran extended the
breadth of her territorial sea to twelve nautical miles.0 With respect
to Saudi Arabia, the first official declaration on the breadth of the
Saudi Arabian territorial sea was made by virtue of the Royal Decree
issued on 28 May 1949,7 which defined that sea as ‘including a distance
of six nautical miles from the coastal sea which lies outside the inland
waters of the Kingdom'. But this decree was later repealed by the
Royal Decree dated 16 February 1958.8 Article 2 of this Decree claims
a belt of internal waters between the coasts of the Kingdom and shoals
or islands extending out to twelve nautical miles, while Article 4 of it
claims a belt of territorial sea lying outside the inland waters of the
Kingdom and extending seaward for a distance of twelve nautical
miles. Article 5 contains a detailed system of ‘base-lines' from which
1I.C.L.Q., 1 (1952), p. 247.
2 Ibid. But see Young, R., ‘Lord Asquith and the Continental Shelf’, A.J.I.L.,
45 (1951), p. 514, where he states that it is doubtful whether ‘the Shaikh [of Abu
Dhabi] is bound for any purpose, except the allocation of concession rights, to
accept Lord Asquith's views’.
3 See, c.g., the Shaikhdoms’ offshore concessions, below, pp. 291, 300-1.
4 MEES, No. II, 18 January 1963. It is to be noted that by Article 1 of the
AOC concession, the ‘concession area’ begins at the end of ‘the distance of six
nautical miles from the low water base or base points used on June 18, 1948, for
delimiting the territorial waters of the Neutral Zone’. And by Article 1 of the
Kuwait-Shcll concession of 1961, ‘the concession area’, begins outside the distance
of six nautical miles from ‘the low water base or base points used on October 11,
1955, for delimiting the territorial waters of Kuwait’. For the Arabic and English
texts of the AOC concession agreement of 1958, and the Kuwait-Shell concession
agreement of 1961. respectively, see Kuwait al-Yawm (Special Issue), No. 181,
13 July 1958, and ibid., No. 311, 22 January 1961.
5 U.N.L.S., Territorial Seas (1957) p. 24.
6 Sec Lauterpacht, E., ‘Contemporary Practice of the United Kingdom in the
Field of International Law’, I.C.L.Q., 9 (1960), p. 278.
7 For English text, see A.J.I.L., Suppl., 43 (1949), Official Documents, p. 154.
8 For English text, see MEES, Suppl., No. 11,18 January 1963. In this Royal
Decree the expression ‘territorial sea’ is used instead of the old expression ‘terri­
torial waters’. This expression conforms to the expression used in the Geneva
Convention on the Territorial Sea of 1958.