HC Deb 17 March 1890 vol 342 cc1007-8
MR. BRYCE (Aberdeen)

I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether the attention of Her Majesty's Government has been called to the statement in the Times of Saturday, the 9th instant, that the Turkish Government was making preparations to receive and settle in its territories 40,000 Mahommedans, who were about to quit their homes in the Caucasus; whether he can inform the House from what part of the Caucasus these intending emigrants come, and in what part of the Sultan's dominions it is intended to place them; and whether Her Majesty's Government, bearing in mind the lamentable consequences which have followed the intrusion of Circassians in various parts of European and Asiatic Turkey, will represent to the Ottoman Government the impolicy of planting settlements of Mahommedan mountaineers in districts inhabited by an agricultural Christian population?

* SIR J. FERGUSSON

In reply to inquiries which were addressed by telegraph to Her Majesty's Ambassador at the Porte, His Excellency reports that many thousand Mussulman inhabitants of the Caucasus, having some years ago been moved from the mountains to the plains, and being dissatisfied there, have applied to the Turkish Government to permit them to establish themselves in Ottoman territory. Sir W. White states that the matter is under consideration, that the Porte is favourably disposed, but arrangements are not completed; that 20,000 of the intending emigrants are males, and the Russian Government are said to be willing to let them go under certain conditions, but before they move localities will have to be selected by delegates probably in provinces of Adana and Konich. Her Majesty's Government have no ground of objection to the migration of a Mussulman community to Ottoman territory on conditions agreeable to the two Powers concerned, and to the community itself.

* MR. BRYCE

Have Her Majesty's Government any objection to make a representation in order to prevent troubles and disorders, which might eventually lead to insurrections and war?

* SIR J. FERGUSSON

The hon. Gentleman will see that that question involves an hypothesis. I have no reason to say that there will be any trouble of the kind.

* MR. BRYCE

I beg to give notice that I will take the first available opportunity for calling attention to the matter, which is one of great gravity.