botswana/namibia - Cour international de Justice
botswana/namibia - Cour international de Justice
botswana/namibia - Cour international de Justice
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579. From the first moment when the British authorities knew of German cartographic<br />
activities in the area, they placed on record that they 'would not be in any way bound by the<br />
geographical results.' (footnote 31 in paragraph 641 below). When the Seiner map was<br />
brought to the attention of the British authorities in 1909 in connection with a possible<br />
arbitration of the southern boundary of the Caprivi strip, they were careful to make no use of<br />
it, and sent instead to the German Government copies of the 1909 version of the Military Map<br />
of 1906 which showed the boundary following the northern bank of the Chobe (Namibian<br />
Memorial, Vol.IV, Annexes 36 and 37, at pages 153,and 154). Apart from the 1933 map<br />
citing the Seiner map as one of its sources, it would seem that greater reliance was placed on<br />
the Streitwolf and Eason maps by the South African and Bechuanaland authorities.14<br />
[14 See the 1915 German South West Africa Military Map. prepared by the South African Defence Force<br />
(Botswana Atlas, Map 12) and Captain Stigand's Sketch map of 1922, Botswana Supplementary Atlas, Map 6.]<br />
An Unpublished map of Captain Streitwolf 1909: 1:200,000, green graph paper<br />
(Botswana Supplementary Atlas, Map 4)<br />
580. Three maps are attributed to Captain Streitwolf, who in his book, Der Caprivi Zipfel,<br />
published by William Susserott, Berlin, 1911, reports that after his arrival in the Caprivi on 25<br />
January 1909, he travelled by boat down the Chobe River in January 1909 (Botswana<br />
Counter-Memorial, Annex 6). He makes no mention of an island.<br />
581. The unpublished Map, reproduced as Map 4 in the Botswana Supplementary Atlas, was<br />
enclosed in a letter dated (Sesheke) 6 May 1909 to the Imperial Administration, Windhoek15.<br />
The map shows the course of the river, and the northern channel but no island and no<br />
boundary.<br />
[15 Akten Betreffend Vorgange <strong>de</strong>s Gouvernements Windhuk betreffend Okawangogebiet und <strong>de</strong>n Caprivzipfel<br />
(Documents concerning records of the Windhoek Administration concerning the Okavango and Caprivi regions)<br />
Vol.I:26 May 1908-11 July 1909 (Nr. <strong>de</strong>s Aktenban<strong>de</strong>s (file no.) (1787) pp.166-178). This map was referred to<br />
in the entry for Captain Streitwolf in Volume III of the Deutsches Kolonial-Lexikon, 1920, where it is stated that<br />
he drew a 'good map of the Caprivi (not published), Botswana Counter-Memorial, Annex 10.]<br />
582. The Namibian Atlas, Map VI, reproduces a copy of of the Eastern Sheet of the Karte<br />
Von Teilen <strong>de</strong>r Nordgrenze Deutsch-Sudwestafrikas, surveyed by Streitwolf in 1909 and<br />
published in Windhoek in 1910, by the German colonial authorities. Contrary to the<br />
unpublished map, the published map shows an island on which the word 'Kassikiri' is written.<br />
As Rushworth notes: 'The position of Kasikili Island is correct but the shape is not as good as<br />
Seiner' (Namibian Memorial, Annex 102, p.39). Seiner's shape, it will be remembered, was<br />
copied from Bradshaw.<br />
583. Map 9 attached to Eason's Report of 1912 appears to be a tracing of the published map,<br />
but omitting any name of the island.<br />
584. It must be a matter of speculation why the map published un<strong>de</strong>r the auspices of the<br />
German colonial authorities inclu<strong>de</strong>d an island when the original map recording Streitwolf's<br />
firsthand observations did not do so: those observations, it is to be noted, involved " route<br />
surveys ..ma<strong>de</strong> by bearing-compass and watch" and "astronomical <strong>de</strong>terminations" (Namibian<br />
Memorial, Annex 104). The failure of the published map to replicate accurately the first-hand<br />
<strong>de</strong>piction of its surveyor, and its inclusion of a named island which does not appear on the<br />
original map, raises doubts on its reliability.