ملف ١٨٥٥\١٩٠٤ الجزء ٨ "الكويت:- موقف زعماء شبه الجزيرة العربية تجاه قبائل الداخلية (نجد إلخ.)" [ظ‎‎٨‎٤] (٣٣٦/١٦٦)

agents there.
Enclosure No. 4.
Eoreign Office to India Office.
Foreign Office,
18th March 1904.
With reference to your letter of the 4th ultimo, I am directed by
the Marquess of Lansciovvne to transmit to you, to be laid before the
Secretary of State for India, copies of correspondence with Ills Majesty s
Ambassador at Constantinople on the subject of the proposal of the
Government of India to send a Political Agent to enquire into the
condition of Nejd.
It will he observed that Sir N. O Conor does not consider that^ this
step would he advisable at the present moment, though he is of opinion
that the proposal should be borne in mind. #
I am accordingly to suggest that the Government of India should be
informed that His Majesty’s Government would prefer that no such
action should be tahen for the present.
The question might he made the subject of further consideration
when more detailed "information is received as to the methods by which
it is proposed that the investigation should be conducted.
I transmit to your Excellency herewith copy of a letter from the
India Office, forwarding correspondence relative to the condition of
affairs in the interior of Turkish Arabia, in which a proposal is made by
the Government of India that a European officer should visit Edadh in
order to report on the state of the tribes.
I also enclose a copy of the reply which I have caused to be returned.
Your Excellency will observe that the Government of India have been
informed that no steps are to be taken to enter into closer relations with
Nejd, or to send agents there, without previous consultation with His
Majesty’s Government.
It will be within your Excellency’s recollection that, since the date of
the Koweit Agreement, proposals have successively been made for the
extension of British protection to the territories of the Sheikhs of
Koweit and El Katr and of the Amir of Nejd, and that on each occasion
His Majesty’s Government have, after full consideration of the
circumstances, decided that it would be inexpedient to incur the
difficulties and embarrassments involved. In the present instance,
though it is no doubt desirable that His Majesty’s Government should
be in possession of fuller information with regard to the interior of
Arabia, the proposed course of deputing a European officer would, in all
probability, lead to further proposals for establishing closer relations
with the Saud family, to which there would be objections at least as
I am, &c.,
The Under Secretary of State
for India.
T. H. Sanderson.
Annex 1.
The Marquess of Lansdowne to Sir N. O’Gonor.
No. 50. (Confidential.)
Eoreign Office,
15th February 1904.
Sir,