§ Mr. DILLONasked whether the Foreign Secretary will lay on the Table a copy of the agreement or treaty with the Sheik of Koweit; and whether he can define the status quo in regard to Koweit which the British Government insists on maintaining?
§ Sir E. GREYI cannot at this stage of the negotiations respecting the Baghdad Railway usefully add to what I have already said on the subject of Koweit.
§ Mr. FELLasked if the negotiations regarding the Baghdad Railway have pro- 1120 ceeded so far as to give to Germany the right to construct a branch line from Alexandretta to join the main line; and if in these negotiations care was taken to assure the active construction of the difficult and expensive portion of the railway through the Taurus mountains, so that the main line shall be completed from the Bosphorus to Baghdad and not only from Alexandretta to Baghdad?
§ Sir E. GREYThe only answer I can give to the first question is to refer the hon. Member to the recent agreement come to by the Turkish Government with the Baghdad Railway Company, the substance of which I gave on the 23rd instant, in reply to the Noble Lord the Member for Hornsey. But I would also draw the hon. Member's attention to Article 12 of the Baghdad Railway Convention of March, 1903, granting the concessionnaires certain preferential rights in respect of any railways which might be built between Mersina and Tripoli. I cannot, not having been a party to the negotiations in question, give precise and definite information in regard to the second question, but construction has already begun on the Taurus section.