'Muscat Dhows Arbitration. In the Permanent Court of Arbitration at the Hague. Grant of the French Flag to Muscat Dhows. The case on behalf of the Government of His Britannic Majesty.' [‎10r] (28/208)

15
December 31,
1896 ; March 16,
1897:
May 3, 1897.
May 4,1897, Suri
dhow A term adopted by British officials to refer to local sailing vessels in the western Indian Ocean. papers,
in closure in No. 26
May 28, 1897.
October 1,1897;
October 25, 1897;
December 7, 1897 ;
December 10.
1897.
ment. At first it was passed over sub silentio, but
ultimately, in reply to a further inquiry, the
Prench Minister in London, on the 16th
March, 1897, informed Lord Salisbury that
there had been a misapprehension, and that
there was no intention of discontinuing the
practice, and in May 1897 the British Govern
ment received a Report from the Sultan of
Muscat, through the British Agent there, that
French papers were being obtained by Suri dhows
at the French Consulate in Zanzibar, then a
British Protectorate, and on the 4th May, 1897,
Commander Hoskyns, of His Majesty's ship,
" Blonde," which was cruising on the Zanzibar
coast for the repression of the Slave Trade, reported
that thirty-eight dhows had changed from Muscat
to Erench nationality at the Erench Consulate at
> Zanzibar, and had obtained permission to carry
passengers.
In May of that year the Sultan of Muscat had
addressed to M. Ottavi, the Erench Consul in
Muscat, a protest against the grant by the Erench
authorities in Aden and Africa of Erench flags to
Omanis. To the protest the Consul replied by the
unfounded statement that the practice had existed
for forty years, and had been accepted by the
Sultan. Eurther correspondence ensued, the Sultan
pressing his protest and the Erench Consul main
taining his contention that only Erench officers
could interfere with dhows carrying Erench
" Sphinx."
I am disposed to
think that the
" Sphinx " dhows
had better be kept
for the Counter-
January 20,1898.
The titre referred
to is exhibited
there.
In 1896 His Majesty's ship " Sphinx " stopped
three dhows at sea near the Oman coast at a
point supposed, at the date of seizure, to be on the
hi^h seas, but afterwards ascertained to be within
O '
the territorial waters of Oman.
On one the papers were found in order. The
other two contained slaves, and were seized and
brought into port, and, after a claim by the Erench
Consul, were handed over to him, and the captains
were ultimately tried at Beunion and convicted of
slave-trading.
One of these dhows, the " Salama," was captained
by Abdullah"bin-Mohammed Baluch,an inhabitant
of Abu Abal's, on the Batineh coast, 50 miles from
Muscat and in the territory of the Sultan.
The vessel was owned by Hamed-bin-Abdullah
Baluch, of the same place. The Erench titre de
navigation was issued at Zanzibar and describes this
Ahmed-bin-Abdullah as residing at Majunga, and
the licence was to ply on the coasts of Madagascar
*