HC Deb 12 May 1885 vol 298 cc362-4
MR. ASHMEAD-BARTLETT

asked the First Lord of the Treasury, Whether the Russian Forces are in occupation of Ak Tepe and Penjdeh, which General Komaroff seized on March 30th; whether the new Boundary Line assigns Penjdeh to Russia; and, for what reasons Her Majesty's Ministers have decided upon the Boundary in London before the arrival of Mr. Stephen or Sir Peter Lumsden?

LORD EDMOND FITZMAURICE

Her Majesty's Government have no positive information whether the Russian troops are in occupation of Ak Tepe and Penjdeh. I must decline to give the terms of an arrangement while negotiations are still going on. Her Majesty's Government are in possession of the necessary information and excellent maps, which have been already supplied by Sir Peter Lumsden.

MR. ASHMEAD-BARTLETT

gave Notice that on the next stage of the Vote of Credit he would call attention to the retention by Russia of Penjdeh seized by General Komaroff in violation of the "sacred covenant," and to the withdrawal of Sir Peter Lumsden, especially in view of the Prime Minister's statement of Monday that nothing had occurred between his firm speech of April 27 and his surrender speech of May 4 to change the views of Her Majesty's Opposition towards the Ministry.

MR. GLADSTONE

It appears to me that under cover of skilfully giving Notice of a Question, the hon. Gentleman has delivered himself of a very considerable portion of a speech which he might have addressed to the House. I wish to ask the permission of the House to advert to a statement I made yesterday, and which in one point I am bound to say is open to some misconstruction. In reply to the right hon. Member for North Devon (Sir Stafford Northcote), not in the course of debate, but before the debate began, I described, and Lord Granville described in "another place," what we believed to be the state of the negotiations between Lord Granville and Lord Kimberley on the part of the British Government and M. de Staal, the Russian Ambassador, assisted by M. Lessar. Upon reading that description, as reported, M. de Staal is under the impression that it might be construed as implying that he and M. Lessar were Plenipotentiaries empowered to conclude a Treaty, in the possession of what are termed full powers for that purpose. I do not know whether the House received that impression from what I said; but I used an expression which undoubtedly might have encouraged it, and which was a wrong expression to employ. I stated that the result of the interviews of those personages had been transmitted to the Emperor of Russia for ratification. Ratification is a technical word, and only applicable, I think, strictly to a Treaty concluded in regular form. What I ought to have said was—transmitted to Russia for approval. M. de Staal has sent to Lord Granville the form in which he would wish to communicate, on his own responsibility, what has taken place— Lord Granville, Lord Kimberley, M. Lessar, and himself (the Russian Ambassador) hare agreed to a draft arrangement relating to the delimitation of Afghanistan. He has submitted the draft for the judgment of his Government, giving it his support. I have no objection to state, and the House will observe, that it does not imply that any point is any longer in dispute between the two countries, so far as represented by M. de Staal and M. Lessar, and by the two Ministers on the other side, but that the judgment of the Emperor and the Russian Government is reserved.

SIR STAFFORD NORTHCOTE

Is it intended that the Agreement, when it is settled, shall be embodied in a Treaty?

MR. GLADSTONE

I stated yesterday what I conceived would be the upshot, the final step to be taken; but I also stated that it was matter for consideration whether the time for acting upon that intention would not be after the actual tracing of the frontier rather than when the principal points were approved by the Russian Government.