A PIRATE KING.

Colonist, Volume LIV, Issue 13480, 27 July 1912, Page 3

A PIRATE KING.

Mohammed Ali Mirza, .who succeeded Ins father, Muzaffar-o'd-din, as Shah of Persia in 1907, and who was deposed in 1909, has become a pirate king in tho Caspian Sea. The Persian Government is offering £50,000 as a reward for his body, dead or alive. At present he is said to bo occupying an impregnable position on the coast, and has in his command two hundred desperadoes who are equal to any villainy. In company with his uncle Malik and his brother Itezad the former Shah recently tured a party of Persians. One of them, a noble, he held for rausom, receiving £50,00U, and the others wer© burned alive. After being deposed from the throne of Persia, Mohammed Ali found himself in financial difficulties. The Persian and Russian Governments

refused him aid, so he accepted the offer of one Kniaz Lianozoff, a rich man known as the "Fish King," who placed a fleet of boats athis former ruler's disposal, and manned ihem with the riffraff of the Caspian. The deposed Shah has set up a regular -court, and has conferred high honours on his piratical associates.. His so-called Minister of the Interior is a robber named Zaurbek Boroff, formerly a Russian police spy who was condemned to hard labour for robbery xindor arms. He fled to Mohammed's court, and the police aro not likely to get him easily, as tho part of the coast frequented by this pirate band is infested with freebooters, who are formidable antagonists. This man Boroff wears a Persian uniform and covers himself with medals given to him by the ex-Shah. Another man high in favour at this strange court is Boroff's brother, an equally desperate character. The Cabinet is formed of people of tho same calibre, but the portfolio of Minister for Finance has not been assigned. Mohammed AH looks after that department himself. Unless Russia will agreel to give Mohammed Ali enough money to live luxu-riantly-elsewhere, he will stay on the Caspian, where he claims to be quite happy, while his income from the depredations of his pirates is said to be enormous. The Russian and British Governments have advised the Persian authorities to pay Mohammed '£25,000 a year to keep out of Persia, but this suggestion is not likely, it is stated, to be adopted.