Emin Arslan

Emin Arslan (13 July 1868 – 9 January 1943) was a Lebanese author, journalist, editor and consul. He was the Consul General of the Ottoman Empire in Bordeaux, Brussels, Paris and Buenos Aires. He authored books and articles in Arabic, Spanish and French.

He initially supported the ideas of the Young Turks, who favoured a reform so as to restore the Ottoman constitution of 1876 and the parliament and grant rights to all the individuals and nations of the Empire. In 1914, while at office as Ottoman Consul General in Buenos Aires, he broke with the Young Turks government due to its alliance with the German Empire and its entrance in World War I, which Arslan harshly criticized.

He denounced the extermination of Armenians from the review he founded and edited, ''La Nota'', in August 1915. During his stay in Europe he had also condemned the Hamidian massacres from the French press.

After the war Arslan initially supported a provisional Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon. As the Mandate prolonged he denounced it as a corrupt and despotic colonization and adhered to the idea of the independence of former Ottoman Syria as a single sovereign state. Provided by Wikipedia