'Gazetteer of the Persian Gulf. Vol I. Historical. Part II. J G Lorimer. 1915' [‎2600] (1117/1262)

2600
icipal
sles of
Declara-
to the Persian Prime Minister and so alarmed him that he begged the
British representative not to formulate it officially. Sir A. Hardinge
went on to propose a special agreement^ by which Britain should accept
the new tariff and Persia in return should undertake not to alter it
without the consent of His Majesty's Government. M. Naus was at
first disinclined to subject the Persian tariff to British as well as to
Russian control; but eventually^ notwithstanding his opposition^ it was
decided to conclude a commercial treaty between Britain and Persia very
closely resembling that between Russia and Persia. One secret article^
attached to the Russo-Persian Declaration; was not reproduced,—an
article that debarred Persia from granting a more favourable tariff to
other countries without the consent of Russia, but at the same time
empowered her to enhance the duties fixed by the tariff against
countries refusing to grant her most favoured nation treatment. There
were also several other differences of detail between the British and
the Russian Declarations. The Anglo-Persian Declaration, drawn up in
order to avoid delay in French and Persian instead of English and
Persian, was signed at Tehran on the 9th of February 1903 and was
sent to England by Lord Downe's Mission, which quitted the Persian
capital upon the following day.
The Declaration was a perpetual agreement; and it is therefore not
open to modification at any future time without the assent of His
Majesty's Government. It provided that certain fixed tariffs, detailed
in special appendices, should be applied to imports into Persia; that
imported goods should not pay any custom duties besides those levied
under the tariff at their entrance into the country—this condition,
however, not to preclude the levying of fees by the Customs for services
rendered; that British traders and goods in Persia should continue to
enjoy, under all conditions, most favoured nation treatment; that duties
should not be levied on goods exported from Persia except in the case
of a few articles specified in an appendix, namely certain articles of food,
live animals, tobacco, opium, raw silk, and precious stones; that Rahdari
and other road taxes should cease in Persia,, except upon carriage roads
constructed under concessions, and that upon such roads a certain fixed
rate should not be exceeded; that the system of farming the customs
should be discontinued throughout Persia and replaced on every frontier
by an efficient organisation under the direct management of the
Central Government ; that bonded warehouses should be established
in which imported goods might remain without payment of duty for
12- months from the day of arrival; and, finally, that a Reglement
General, defining the executive arrangements and procedure of the
Persian Imperial Customs, should be established by the Administration
in agreement with the British Legation at Tehran. The customs of
every frontier of Persia were expressly declared to be included in the
scope of the Declaration, which also contained an article providing for
proportional modification of the duties in case of serious fluctuations in
the value of the Persian Qran. By means of observations appended
to the body of the Declaration it was agreed that customs duties might
be paid in Bank of England notes, so long as repayment of such notes
in gold continued to be guaranteed by the British Government; that
cases of infractions of the rules should be adjudicated upon by the
local Director of Customs in consultation with a British Consular