UK using 'fake boundaries' in Iran dispute - former British envoy

[persis]

Fake Maritime Boundaries

The British government is using 'fake maritime boundaries' in its claim that Iran's arrest of its servicemen was allegedly in Iraqi territorial waters, according to former head of Foreign Office's maritime section, Craig Murray.

"The Iran/Iraq maritime boundary shown on the British government map does not exist. It has been drawn up by the British Government," Murray said after the Ministry of Defence published a map about the incident on Wednesday.

"This published boundary is a fake with no legal force," he said.

"Only Iraq and Iran can agree their bilateral boundary, and they never have done this in the (Persian) Gulf," he pointed out.

Murray, who previously carried out British negotiations on the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, said the only boundary was inside the river between the two countries because there is the land border too.

When presenting Britain's claim, deputy chief of defence staff, Vice Admiral Charles Style admitted that his government had been given a second set of coordinates by Iran about last Friday's detention of 15 marines and sailors that were in Iranian waters.

The former diplomat, who was dismissed as Britain's Ambassador to Uzbekistan in 2004 after disagreeing with his government's foreign policy, castigated the press for failing to challenge the validity of government's claim.

"The mainstream media and even the blogosphere has bought this hook, line and sinker," he said.

Murray said that even accepting the British coordinates showed that the incident took place "closer to Iranian land than Iraqi land." This, he said, also "underlines the point that the British produced border is not a reliable one."
Earlier this week, he said that Iran's action in detaining foreign military personnel was legitimate under international law.

He also questioned what Britain's navy was doing in allegedly looking for smuggled cars when the incident took place.

Britain would have been allowed to enter Iranian territorial waters if in "Hot pursuit" of terrorists, slavers or pirates, but "they weren't doing any of those things," Murray said.
"Maritime boundaries don't appear by magic. They are enshrined in treaties, judgements or arbitrations and registered with the UN. Where do you find this boundary?" Murray said.

http://www.craigmurray.co.uk/archives/2007/03/fake_maritime_b.html

 

[papasmerf]

Ummmmmm

keep saying it and maybe you will believe it.

 

[Questor]

Thanks Persis. This article confirms what I have suspected. The whole incident was a provocation on the part of the US/Brit coalition. The US is about to declare war on Iran. Its been a steady march east. First Afganistan, then Iraq, next Iran, followed by Pakistan? It is quite likely that the attack on Iran will destablize the pro-American Pakistani government. The whole situation is about to get a lot more complicated and dangerous.

 

[persis]

For a little historical context, the USS Vincennes was in Iranian waters when it fired its missile that shot down an Iranian airliner. The US denied it for years before finally admitting it....of course during the last years of the Iran Iraq war; the U.S. was operating all kinds of "black" naval operations in the Gulf against Iranian naval units as well as targets in Iran itself.
Finally, surely someone must see the humor in British government objecting to Iran's showing the British prisoners on television as a violation of the Geneva Convention. Good to know
George Bush's strongest ally takes the Convention so seriously......
To find Brits troops being sent into the disputed waters, as corroborated by Brigadier Jasim Hakim the head of the Iraqi border security for the area, whom is on record; 'when fishermen informed us of the position of the British personnel, we were surprised to find the British operating in sensitive Iranian territories.' Has not been of any concern, yet the outrage allbeit artificial is heating up.

Now the nice newsman on the telly would not dare to hint at this, after all the 'two minutes hate' would be meaningless without the 'Iranian Villains

.....

 

[YellowDog]

Iran is a fake country. Like Palestine it really does not exist. Therefore it has no real borders.

 

[Cheeta]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran

 

[papasmerf]

Well, persis at least you are pompous

 

[YellowDog]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran

Damn, it won't let me edit the article to make the appropriate corrections.

 

[basketcase]

Fake Maritime Boundaries
The British government is using 'fake maritime boundaries' in its claim that Iran's arrest of its servicemen was allegedly in Iraqi territorial waters, according to former head of Foreign Office's maritime section, Craig Murray.
...

"Only Iraq and Iran can agree their bilateral boundary, and they never have done this in the (Persian) Gulf," he pointed out.
...

So does this guy check facts? http://www.semp.us/biots/biot_152.html

Following the 1958 coup-etat in Iraq, Iran sought to redraw the Shatt boundary using the thalweg principle (more on this below). In 1975, Iraq and Iran met during the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) in Algiers to sign the so-called Algiers Accord, which recognized the line running down the middle of the bottom of the murky Shatt, in the mud, as the official border between Iraq and Iran.

This line, called the thalweg (a German word compounded from “thal”, valley, and “weg”, way), joins the lowest points along the entire length of a streambed or valley. The thalweg principle is the principle of determining national boundaries at the thalweg of a river separating two states.

Saddam Hussein became president of Iraq in 1979. In September 1980 he invaded Iran with the support of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, ostensibly to retake full control of the Shatt, according to the 1937 Treaty (see above) and also, if possible, to annex Iran’s oil-rich Khuzestan province. What started as a boundary dispute became the bloody Iran-Iraq War, sometimes called the First Persian Gulf War, which lasted eight years (1980-1988) (see http://www.semp.us/biots/biot_150.html). The end of the war left the talweg boundary between Iraq and Iran unchanged.

Only three short years after the conclusion of the Iran-Iraq War in 1988, Saddam Hussein, in the lead-up to the 1991 Persian Gulf War (sometimes called the Second Persian Gulf War), once again recognized the 1975 Algiers Accord (thalweg principle) to appease Iranians before he undertook his invasion of Kuwait to whom he incidentally owed billions of dollars for the Iran-Iraq War.

Seems like this is the latest outlet of the conspiracy nuts.

 

[persis]

The land boundary agreed between Iran and Iraq in 1975 extended only to the mouth of the Shatt al Arab River at the lowest low-water line. Also the1975 Algiers Accord (talks about, future talks, for a possible, probable agreement) about the disputed borders between then Shah and Saddam
British charts of the area show the low-water line (the normal baseline from which the territorial sea is measured) running around 100 meters south of where the British government says the incident took place.
Martin Pratt
Director of Research
International Boundaries Research Unit
Durham University

.....

 

[Aardvark154]

Apropos news item from AP

"The National Council of Resistance of Iran — the political wing of the Iranian MEK opposition group which is listed as a terrorist group by Britain, the U.S. and the European Union — said the British crew's capture was planned in advance, but offered no evidence to support the claims.

Hossein Abedini, a member of the opposition group's foreign affairs committee, said that an Iranian Revolutionary Guard naval garrison had been on alert from the night before the kidnapping, to prepare for the operation. "You can see that the clerical regime had in a premeditated act arrested British sailors in order to win concessions from the international community and divert attention from its nuclear project, claims that the sailors were arrested in Iranian territorial waters are baseless."

Mohammad Mohaddessin, who handles foreign affairs for the council, said in a statement that Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, had ordered the detention of the Britons in the hope of pressuring the British government over a threat to toughen U.N. sanctions."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070331/ap_on_re_eu/british_seized_iran

 

[Aardvark154]

"Murray said that even accepting the British coordinates showed that the incident took place 'closer to Iranian land than Iraqi land.' This, he said, also 'underlines the point that the British produced border is not a reliable one.'"

In and off itself that the location was closer to Iran than Iraq isn't particularly informative and really doesn't necessarily imply what Ambasador Murray says it does. Because while thalweg borders are more common there are many cases where borders either run along one bank of a river or come much closer to one side of an open body of water then the other.

 

[*d*]

So does this guy check facts? http://www.semp.us/biots/biot_152.html
Seems like this is the latest outlet of the conspiracy nuts.

I didn't know the hostage taking happened on the river Shatt.

 

[persis]

In and off itself that the location was closer to Iran than Iraq isn't particularly informative and really doesn't necessarily imply what Ambasador Murray says it does. Because while thalweg borders are more common there are many cases where borders either run along one bank of a river or come much closer to one side of an open body of water then the other.

"King's College of London's Richard Schofield, an expert on the Iran-Iraq border, interview by telephone explained that although "basically, there is a boundary" nowadays along the Shatt al-Arab River, that's not the case further out in the Persian Gulf where the British sailors and marines were taken prisoner."
See the map presented by the UK Ministry of Defense

 

[basketcase]

Persis, your source about the "lowest water point" is intentionaly using misleading information.

Here's a definition of how it works.

The mean low water mark may be an unlimited distance from permanently exposed land, provided that some portion of elevations exposed at low tide but covered at high tide (like mud flats) is within 12 nautical miles of permanently exposed land

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Territorial_waters
This means that it is a measurement from the furthest bit of mud uncovered at low tide at any point of the area. That means that low point might be far outside of permanently navigable waters.

Why does this waterway play a role even when the incident took place outside of it? Could it be because the territorial water boundary extends from that point outwards?

 

[onthebottom]

Persis,

If we follow your logic that there is no recognized boundary outside the river mouth then what is Iran's justification for taking the sailors - how can you be over a line you have not drawn......

I would think the Iranians have the burden of proof in this situation and your argument makes that even more difficult.

OTB

 

[persis]

Persis,

If we follow your logic that there is no recognized boundary outside the river mouth then what is Iran's justification for taking the sailors - how can you be over a line you have not drawn......

I would think the Iranians have the burden of proof in this situation and your argument makes that even more difficult.

OTB

You got it all back ward, but I don’t blame you for your confusion (That is what happens when people source of history is from Movies like 300 & a quick search off www.wikip…..etc)

Iran has been there since the beginning of the time, the modern Iraq with its disputed borders however is a made up country created in 1932 under British Mandate.

The Iran-Iraq boundary argument “It's more just a provisional indication of what Iraq's territorial water claims might be." Says Schofield, King College.
Hint...Sadam went to war over his wishful claim, how about you?...do you feel lucky punk?... jk

 

[papasmerf]

You got it all back ward, but I don’t blame you for your confusion (That is what happens when people source of history is from Movies like 300…..etc)

Iran has been there since the beginning of the time, the modern Iraq with its disputed borders however is a made up country created in 1932 under British Mandate.

The Iran-Iraq boundary argument “It's more just a provisional indication of what Iraq's territorial water claims might be." Says Schofield, King College.

Sorta like Israel has been there since the beginning of time?

 

[Gyaos]

Iran has been there since the beginning of the time...

Buzzer sound! It wasn't called Iran since the "beginning or time". In fact, it wasn't called Iran a while back either. Bomb, bomb, bomb ... bomb, bomb Iran!

Gyaos Baltar.

 

[Aardvark154]

Iran has been there since the beginning of the time, the modern Iraq with its disputed borders however is a made up country created in 1932 under British Mandate.

But for the purposes of which we are speaking Iraq is a successor state to the Ottoman Empire which in this sense was a successor state to Abbasid Caliphate. It isn't as though there was this uninhabited region to the west of Iran.