IOR/R/15/2/620

The file contains correspondence, mainly between 1941 and 1944 and starts with reports of the building of a fortified tower at the town of Diba [Dibba] (also spelt Dhibah, Daba) by the minority Qawasim [Āl Qawāsim] (also spelt Jawasim) inhabitants, subjects of the Regent of Kalba [Kalbā'], for protection from cross-border raids by the local Shihuh [Shiḥūḥ] (also spelt Shahuh) majority population, subjects of the Sultan of Muscat. The correspondence discusses the opposition of the Muscat authorities both to the building of this defensive post on the boundary between Qawasim and Shihuh territory and to the occupation of three Qawasim villages in nearby Wadi Madha land in the Shamaliyah District, by armed men sent by the Regent of Kalba, in response to an appeal by the villagers for protection against Shihuh attacks. Also reported are the several visits to Diba by official representatives from Muscat and Kalba, as well as local British officials, to secure a temporary truce and resolve the more or less permanent state of tribal conflict existing in the locality, by negotiating a lasting peace settlement.

The main correspondents are the Residency Agent and the Political Officer for the Trucial Coast, (both based at Sharjah); the Political Agents for Bahrain and Muscat; and the Political Resident in the Persian Gulf. There are also English translations and one Arabic transcript of several letters from Shaikh Khalid bin Ahmad [Āl Qasimī, Shaikh Khālid bin Ahmad] the Regent of Kalba to the Residency Agent, Sharjah, mainly in 1941, about repeated attacks on Diba by the Shihuh and the progress of his peace negotiations with the representative of the Sultan of Muscat and Oman. There are English translations of several other letters from the Sultan of Muscat and Oman and his ministers, to the Regent of Kalba and the British Consul Muscat, about outbreaks of fighting between the Shihuh and Qawasim at Diba, including a list of Shihuh complaints against the Qawasim (folio 70) and the peace agreement made in 1941 (folio 74).

The file also includes a small, black and white photograph (folio 78) of the fortified tower at Diba, taken in 1944 by the Political Officer for the Trucial Coast, Sharjah, after it had been rebuilt in contravention of the peace agreement between the Qawasim and Shihuh inhabitants.