IOR/L/PS/12/2083

This file relates to changes to the administration of French-ruled Syria during the 1930s and early to mid-1940s.

The file consists of copies of received Foreign Office correspondence, which have been forwarded by the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs to the Under-Secretary of State for India. Most of the correspondence received by the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (Sir John Simon; Anthony Eden; Viscount Halifax) is either from His Majesty's Consul at Damascus (Edwyn Cecil Hole, succeeded by Gilbert Mackereth) or from His Majesty's Consul at Aleppo (George Evelyn Arthur Cheyne Monck-Mason, succeeded by Archibald William Davis).

The French material in the file consists of copies of decrees, correspondence and a communique produced by the French High Commissioner in Syria and Lebanon (Auguste Henri Ponsot; Damien de Martel; Gabriel Puaux).

Items of discussion include the following:

• The political atmosphere in Aleppo and Damascus in the run-up to Syria's first parliamentary elections under its new constitution, in late 1931 and early 1932.
• An attempted assassination of Subhi Bey Barakat [Subhi Bay Barakat al-Khalidi], former President of Syria, by a student from Homs, in 1932.
• Reports of tense relations in Aleppo, between Syrians identified as 'moderates' and 'extremists' by the British, following the elections.
• Reports on the first sessions of the new Syrian Parliament in June 1932.
• Details of a 1937 decree issued by the French High Commissioner, granting a general amnesty to those referred to in the correspondence as 'political offenders'.
• The resignation of the Syrian Government in March 1939 and the resignation of the Syrian President [Hashim Bay Khalid al-Atassi] on 7 July 1939.
• The resignation of the Syrian Defence Minister, Nabih el Azmeh [Nabi al-Azmeh], in June 1946.

The file includes a divider which gives a list of correspondence references contained in the file by year. This is placed at the back of the correspondence.