Sovereignty and Jurisdiction in Eastern Arabia
1958; Oxford University Press; Volume: 34; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês
10.2307/2605863
ISSN1468-2346
Autores Tópico(s)Socioeconomic Development in MENA
ResumoA REMINDER of the difficulties and complications that can arise from the absence of any agreed frontiers in Eastern and SouthEastern Arabia has recently been afforded by the struggle in Oman between the Sultan of Muscat and the soi-disant Imam, Ghalib ibn Ali. To some observers at the time the gravest implication of the struggle appeared to lie in the opportunity it offered Saudi Arabia to resume the pursuit of her long-standing ambition to gain control of South-Eastern Arabia by giving the Imam and his followers material and moral backing; it was even suspected that the Saudi Arabian Government might have actively instigated the Imam to raise the standard of revolt. While there is a danger, in so emphasizing the external influences that may have contributed to the uprising, of under-estimating its more relevant internal causes, it is nevertheless true to say, as some commentators have said, that the opportunities for Saudi Arabia to exploit a disturbed situation of this kind might have been considerably fewer if the frontiers in this part of Arabia had been delineated. So long as these remain vague and unfixed King Saud will continue to feel free to challenge the authority of the Sultan of Muscat and Oman and that of the rulers of the Trucial Shaikhdoms in the western marches of their dominions, as he did five years ago when he despatched a force to seize the Buraimi Oasis. Unfortunately, the demarcation of the frontiers of Eastern Arabia is a task of far greater complexity than the readiness with which the suggestions were put forward during the Oman troubles would indicate, and the opposition of Saudi Arabia, now as in the past, to any boundary settlement not based upon the complete acceptance of her claims is far from being the only difficulty in the way of such a settlement. Sovereignty and jurisdiction, the essential accompaniments of frontier delineation, are not subjects that admit of easy discussion in the context of the desert borderlands of Eastern Arabia; nor has the political evolution of the countries of the region yet reached a stage where these concepts might be expected to possess easily recognizable force and meaning. The only frontiers in existence in Eastern Arabia, defined by treaty and internationally recognized, are those of Kuwait with Saudi Arabia and the frontiers of both with the neutral zone lying between them on the Persian Gulf coast. Elsewhere in Eastern Arabia there are what might be termed frontieres de convenance which have not yet received the sanction i6
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