مجموعة ٦/ ١٩ "الجزيرة العربية: (المملكة العربية السعودية) التقرير السنوي لمملكة الحجاز ونجد." [و‎‎٣‎٠] (٥٤٠/٦٠)

conveyed to the Saudi Government. In 1934, when C.A.S.O.C. were beginning
operations in Hasa, the United States Government asked His Majesty’s Govern
ment for information about the boundaries in those parts. His Majesty s
Government furnished the information, and explained carefully, for the informa
tion of the company, that the legal frontier in that area was the blue line. The
Saudi Government\vere duly informed at the time of this communication to the
United States Government. Since then His Majesty’s Government had not
informed either the United States Government or the Saudi Government that they
no longer regard the blue line as the legal frontier or that they consideied the
company free to operate to the east of that line. His Majesty’s Government felt
that they would have been justified in protesting to the Saudi Government when
they learned that the company, in spite of the information conveyed to the Saudi
Government, were operating near Qasr-al-Salwa. On the contrary, out of
deference to His Majesty, and in their desire to facilitate matters for him and
for the company, they merely informed representatives of the company, quite
informally, that, notwithstanding the previous communications to the United
States and Saudi Governments, they would raise no objection to the company s
operating to the east of the line which His Majesty’s Government still regarded as
the legal eastern frontier of Saudi territory, on the understanding that the com
pany would not encroach on territory to the east of the extreme limit pi oposed by
His'Majesty’s Government to the Saudi Government. His Majesty’s Government
had acted in accordance with the practice in cases where important oil companies,
whether of the same or of different nationalities, are operating in adjoining areas,
and they regretted that the Saudi Government should take exception to a normal
procedure designed to ensure the maintenance of good relations between the great
oil companies and also between the countries in which they are registered.
125. The second untoward event was more serious. In January, Fuad Bey,
in the course of a discussion with His Majesty’s Minister, referred to a letter
which Mr. Calvert had written to him on the '28th September, 1935, and asked
whether the fourth paragraph did not constitute an assurance. This paragraph
reads :—
“ The southern limit of the oil concession granted to the Anglo-Iranian
Oil Company by the Sheikh of Qatar does not extend beyond this ‘ green
line,’ but lies to a considerable distance to the north of it. The concession
does not, therefore, extend to any territory under discussion with the Saudi
Government.”
Fuad Bey asked whether the territory now in dispute was not in dispute then,
and whether the Saudi Government were not justified in taking this paragraph
as an assurance.
126. It would be tedious and unprofitable to develop this point in detail.
It was clear that the Saudi Government had read the second sentence, which was
copied word for word from the Foreign Office instructions, as meaning that no
territory claimed by the Saudi Government had been included in the Qatar con
cession, whereas the words ‘ ‘ territory under discussion ’ ’ were intended by His
Majesty’s Government to be read in the light of their repeated assertions that they
were not prepared to discuss any further abatement of their claims beyond the
green line. (It is true that soon after the letter of September 1935 was written
His Majesty’s Government did in fact modify the green line slightly in Ibn Sand’s
favour, but not in the region relevant to this issue.) It seemed possible at first
that Fuad Bey had raked up this point to delay and confuse the issue, but this
theory was disposed of by his obvious consternation when His Majesty’s Minister
told him what the letter really meant. It is admitted that the letter might have
been less ambiguous, and unfortunately it reached the Saudi Government when
Fuad Bey was away, so that the officials concerned went by the Arabic text, which
contained a mistranslation; a borrowed translator, in the absence of a good Arabic
equivalent for “considerable distance,” had written “great distance.” The
Saudi Government had no reply to the reminder of His Majesty’s Minister that in
all communications from the legation the English is the official text, the Arabic
translation being supplied out of courtesy and without guarantee as to its
accuracy, but it is to be feared that Ibn Saud was annoyed, and that some suspicion
of our good faith remained in his mind.