خارجي ٤١/٥٠٠١ "بلاد فارس - الشؤون الداخلية (إرساليات متنوعة)". [و‎‎٢‎٨] (٢٤٨/٥٥)

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blamed. The clamour has taken the line that the interliees should be brought
to trial under Persian law and that in any case the security danger is over and
it is time for release.
35. the agitation took its rise from an incident which occurred at the
lehran Internment Camp when the internees were inspected by a British sub
altern. 1 his officer was assailed with abuse by an overwrought colonel, and the
' episode was interpreted in the press as a further example of British brutality.
36. In the Majlis, on the 1st February, Dr. Musaddiq questioned the
Minister for Foreign Affairs as to the legal justification of the arrest and con
finement of the internees and, in spite of Anglo-Russian efforts to prime the
Minister with suitable powder for a reply, received a deplorably weak and
inconclusive answer, which did little or nothing to damp down the agitation.
37. lo counter these developments, His Majesty’s Embassy published an
official statement of the facts of the incident at the camp and released to the
world press, Reuter, A.P. and U.P., the complete story of the German spies,
Gametha and Mayr, and of the Melliun Society. This in turn provoked further
protestation in the press, ranging from denunciation of this alleged endeavour
to discredit Persia in the eyes of the United Nations and so to deny her the
rewards she anticipates from San Francisco, to a flat refusal to believe the story.
38. Ihe general disloyalty of the Persian authorities was again made clear
by the indulgent treatment vouchsafed to the internees in the Tehran Camp,
the transfer of one of them, without authority, on grounds of sickness, from the
camp to his private house, and the failure of the Government to implement a
promise to reduce to the rank of major an internee who had been promoted to
lieutenant-colonel.
39. As the Russians had been largely exempt from the odium incurred by
the British in virtue of the continued internment of Persians, and as, although
the Russian Ambassador concurred in protesting against the futility of the
Foreign Minister s leply to the agitation against it, he seemed to be disposed
to disclaim the Russian share of responsibility, a notice was inserted in the
press by His Majesty’s Embassy, emphasising the joint responsibility of both
British and Russians. His Majesty s Embassy tried to get the Soviet Embassy
to agree to this action, but as they refused, were compelled to act alone.
40. On the 12th February all the Persian internees remaining in the
Sultanabad Camp, except the dangerous, and very anti-British mullah, Seyvid
Abul Qasim Kashani, were transferred to the Persian Internment CamiV in
lehran. Kashani v'as later removed to Kermanshah.
41. The progressive release of the Persian internees in Tehran, except for
a few who may have to be detained until the war with Japan is over, is now
proposed by the British security authorities, and the Soviet Embassy have been
asked to approve the release of the first eight.
^ i P n ^ arc h, thirteen German, Czech and other internees were
removed from Sultanabad to a camp in Iraq and the Sultanabad camp was
closed. r
43. On the 18th March, Sheikh Abdul Majid Shirazi, whose name has been
on the Anglo-Soviet list of enemy partisans in connexion with the Mayr con
spiracy, was arested by the Persian police. And on the 2nd April, Constantine
Kassakowski, the last undesirable German to be at large in Persia, was arrested
at Shah Reza by the gendarmerie at the request of the British authorities and
handed over to the latter.
British A rmy Interests.
1 , 44 -. 4n 1 th ® cours e of the last twelve months the British combatant troops
in 1 ersia (which were about 11,000) were reduced by 800 men.
4 5. ^ Thefts of signal wire still continue in spite of strong protests by His
Majesty s Embassy against what amounts in effect to sabotage of Allied military
communications. The Persian army has taken over the protection of wire over
an additional stretch west of Tehran and south of Tehran and are now r responsible
for some 150 miles.
7 he Press and Public Opinion.
46. During the early part of the period under review the press and public
opmmn were chiefly occupied with the crisis over the demand by the Soviet
Emon for an oil concession in Northern Persia. The press, over this question
was divided into two mam groups, namely the Freedom Front (i e the papers