IOR/R/15/5/92

The file includes letters (drafts, originals, and copies), telegrams, and notes relating to secret negotiations over the lease of Bander Shweikh [Ash Shuwaykh] from the Shaikh of Kuwait. The correspondence is mostly between the Political Agent, Kuwait, Political Resident in the Persian Gulf (or his assistant) in Bushire, and the Foreign Department of the Government of India, but also includes communications from the Ambassador in Constantinople, Admiralty, India Office, Senior Naval Officer in the Persian Gulf, Marine Department of the Government of India, Foreign Office, Shaikh Mobarek of Kuwait [Mubārak bin Ṣabāḥ Āl Ṣabāḥ], and Shaikh Ahmad al-Jabir [Aḥmad al-Jābir Āl Ṣabāḥ]. Following the First World War the Political Resident communicated with the Civil (later High) Commissioner in Iraq rather than the Government of India.

The papers cover the following matters:

• the secret negotiations over the terms of the lease agreement between the Political Agent, Kuwait and Shaikh Mobarek, such as customs rates and the inclusion of the island of Warba
• concern about how the Turks might view the agreement
• use of the site as the terminus of the Baghdad Railway
• arrangements for the annual payments to the Shaikh
• construction of buildings such as coal sheds and structures such as moorings
• the precise delimitations of the plot to be leased
• termination of the lease and the question of whether to replace it with a subsidy for the Shaikh
• future use of the buildings
• arrangements for a refund following an overpayment

The file includes the following documents:

• Captain Heming's report on the position and requirements for the proposed plot (folios 3-6)
• the final agreement, signed in October 1907, in English and Arabic (folios 118-36)
• a sketch plan of the Bander Shweikh foreshore (folio 185)