IOR/L/PS/10/110

The volume discusses the arms trade at Muscat and attempts by the British Government and the Sultan of Muscat to prohibit it; also included are reports and discussions from the Conference on Arms Traffic which was being held in Brussels in 1909 at the same time as the discussions in the volume.

Included in the volume is correspondence with the French Consul at Muscat (Lucien-Ernest-Roger Laronce, and Charles Céleste Albert Jeannier) and representatives of the Government of France regarding both the need for French co-operation to enforce the prohibition, and suspicions that French merchants at Muscat were involved in the trade.

The later correspondence discusses the following: a proposal made by the French Government that would have seen the Gambia being given by Britain to France; the decision by the French Government to attempt to end the arms trade in Jibuti [Djibuti]; and reports on the work of British naval authorities to stop vessels in the Persian Gulf and seize arms and ammunition.

The principal correspondents for the British Government include the Political Resident in the Persian Gulf (Percy Zachariah Cox); the Political Agent and Consul at Maskat [Muscat] (William George Grey, Robert Erskine Holland, and Arthur Prescott Trevor); the Secretary to the Government of India in the Foreign Department (Sir Louis William Dane, and Sir Spencer Harcourt Butler); the Naval Commander-in-Chief for the East Indies Station (Sir Edmund Samuel Poe, and Edmond John Warre Slade); the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (Sir Edward Grey); the Secretary of State for the Colonies (Victor Alexander Bruce, Lord Elgin); the British Ambassador to France (Sir Francis Leveson Bertie, 1st Viscount Bertie of Thame), and representatives of the Foreign Office, the Colonial Office, and the India Office.

This volume is part 1 of 10. Each part includes a divider which gives the subject and part numbers, the year the subject file was opened, the subject heading, and a list of correspondence references contained in that part by year. This is placed at the back of the correspondence.