"الملف 35/85 III A 10 مسألة الأعلام الفرنسية" [ظ‎‎١‎٢‎٣] (٦١٠/٢٥٧)

to fly the flag of one of the Signatory Powers shall in future only be granted
to such native vessels, which shall satisfy all the three following conditions :—
1. Their fitters-out or owners must be either subjects of or persons pro
tected by the Power whose flag they claim to fly,
2. They must furnish proof that they possess real estate situated in the
district of the authority to whom their application is addressed,
or supply a solvent security as a guarantee for any fines to which
they may eventually become liable,
3. Such fitters-out or owners, as well as the captain of the vessel, must
furnish proof that they enjoy a good reputation, and especially
that they have never been condemned for acts of slave trade,
Whereas in default of a definition of the term " protege" in the General Act
of the Brussels Conference this term must be understood in the sense which
corresponds best as w-ell to the elevated aims of the Conference and its Final Act,
as to the principles of the law of nations, as they have been expressed in treaties
existing at that time, in internationally recognized legislation and in international
practice.
Whereas the aim of the said article 32 is to admit to navigation in the
seas infested ^ by slave trade only those native vessels which are under the
-strictest surveillance of the Signatory Powers, a condition which can only be
secured if the owners, fitters-out and crews of such vessels are exclusively
subjected to the sovereignty and jurisdiction of the State, under whose flag they
are sailing.
Whereas since the restriction which the term "protege" underwent m
virtue of the legislation of the Ottoman Porte of 1863, 1865, and 1869,
especially of the Ottoman law of 23 Sefer 1280 (August 1863) implicitly
accepted by the Powers who enjoy the rights of capitulations, and since
the Treaty concluded between France and Morocco in 1863, to which a great
number of other Powers have acceded and which received the sanction of the
Convention of Madrid of July 30, 1880, the term "protege" embraces in
relation to States of capitulations only the following classes 1°. persons being
subjects of a country which is under the protectorate of the Power whose
protection they claim, 2 0 . individuals corresponding to the classes enumerated
in the treaties with Morocco of 1863 and 1880 and in the Ottoman law of 1863,
3 0 . persons, who under a special treaty have been recognized as " proteges } ' r
like those enumerated by article 4 of the French Muscat ConvenHon of
1844 and 4 0 . those individuals who can establish that they had been considered
and treated as " proteges " by the Power in question before the year in which
the creation of new " proteges " was regulated and limited, that is to say before
the year 1863, these individuals not having lost the status they had once
legitimately acquired,
Whereas that, although the Powers have expressis verbis resigned the exer
cise of the pretended right to create "proteges" in unlimited number only in
relation to Turkey and Morocco, nevertheless the exercise of this pretended
right has been abandoned also in relation to other Oriental States, analogy having
always been recognized as a mean to complete the very deficient written regula
tions of the capitulations as far as circumstances are analogous.
Whereas on the other hand the concession de facto made by Turkev
that the status of " proteges " be transmitted to the descendants of persons who
in 1863 had enjoyed the protection of a Christian Power, cannot be extended bv
analogy to Muscat, where the circumstances are entirely dissimilar, the ,s pro-
t f4^ S " of / he C 1 hr . lstian Powers in Turkey being of race, nationality 'and religion
different from their Ottoman rulers, whilst the inhabitants of Sur and other
Muscat people who might apply for French flags, are in ail these respects en
tirely in the same condition as the other subjects of the Sultan of Muscat,
Whereas the dispositions of article 4 of the French-Muscat Treaty of 1844.
apply only to persons who are bona fide in the service of French subjects but
business^ 50113 ^ ^ ^ ships " papers for the P ur Pose of doing any commercial
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