PERSIAN OIL DISPUTE

Hawera Star, Volume LII, 25 January 1933, Page 9

PERSIAN OIL DISPUTE

LATE EDITION

REPUDIATION OF CONTRACT VENTILATION EEFCTBE LEAGUE HOPES FOll CONCILIATION. BENEFICIAL TO BOTH PARTIES. (British Official Wireless.) Received 12.25 p.m., to-day. RUGBY, Jan. 24. Th e League Council has appointed M. Benes of Czechoslovakia as rapporteur on the dispute between Britain and Persia regarding the repudiation of the Anglo-Persian Company’s contract. The matter will be taken up by the Council on Thursday. The Persian delegates at Geneva already have.revealed some of the arguments by which they hope to justify the repudiation of the contract and their contention that, as the company ought to have had recourse to the Persian courts, the case was not one with which the League ought to deal. It appears that many of the statements contained in the Persian Government’s memorandum were based on a misunderstanding and it is hoped the majority of the points will easily he cleared up upon explanation' in the conciliatory atmosphere of the League. Sir John Simon is to justify the action of the British Government in bringing the case before League, a course of action which, it is hoped in. London, will produce an amicable and equitable settlement beneficial to both parties. Surprise was caused at London by the statement that the Persian Government’s memorandum to the AngloPersian Companv confined extraction for over 30 years to an area of a little more than one square mile and the contention that the company intended to develop the concession to the fullest possible limits. Actually the area, of the company’s Persian oilfields from the whole of which oil is now being extracted amounts to about 150 square miles. The company technically examined over 150,000 square miles, driller! 140.000 feet and carried out 380 geological surveys. The company spent £3.500,000 on work of this character outside of the two proved producing oilfields.