Lev Mikhailovich Karakhan (''Karakhanian'', , ; 20 January 1889 – 20 September 1937) was a Russian revolutionary and a Soviet diplomat. A member of the

RSDLP The Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP), also known as the Russian Social Democratic Workers' Party (RSDWP) or the Russian Social Democratic Party (RSDP), was a socialist political party founded in 1898 in Minsk, Russian Empire. The ...

from 1904. At first a

Menshevik The Mensheviks ('the Minority') were a faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) which split with Vladimir Lenin's Bolshevik faction at the Second Party Congress in 1903. Mensheviks held more moderate and reformist ...

, he joined the

Bolshevik The Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin, were a radical Faction (political), faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) which split with the Mensheviks at the 2nd Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party, ...

s in May 1917. In October 1917, he was member of the

Revolutionary Military Council The Revolutionary Military Council (), sometimes called the Revolutionary War Council Brian PearceIntroductionto Fyodor Raskolnikov s "Tales of Sub-lieutenant Ilyin." or ''Revvoyensoviet'' (), was the supreme military authority of Soviet Rus ...

; then served as secretary of the Soviet delegation at the Brest-Litovsk peace talks together with

Leon Trotsky Lev Davidovich Bronstein ( – 21 August 1940), better known as Leon Trotsky,; ; also transliterated ''Lyev'', ''Trotski'', ''Trockij'' and ''Trotzky'' was a Russian revolutionary, Soviet politician, and political theorist. He was a key figure ...

and

Adolph Joffe Adolph Abramovich Joffe (; alternatively transliterated as Adolf Ioffe or Yoffe; 10 October 1883 – 16 November 1927) was a Russian revolutionary, Bolshevik politician and Soviet diplomat of Karaite descent. Biography Revolutionary career ...

. In 1918-1920 and 1927–1934, he was the Deputy

People's Commissar Commissar (or sometimes ''Kommissar'') is an English language, English transliteration of the Russian language, Russian (''komissar''), which means 'commissary'. In English, the transliteration ''commissar'' often refers specifically to the pol ...

for Foreign Affairs. In 1919, he issued a statement concerning relations with China called the Karakhan Manifesto. In 1921, he was the Soviet Ambassador to

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

; in 1923–1926, the Ambassador to

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

; after 1934, the Ambassador to

Turkey Turkey, officially the Republic of Türkiye, is a country mainly located in Anatolia in West Asia, with a relatively small part called East Thrace in Southeast Europe. It borders the Black Sea to the north; Georgia (country), Georgia, Armen ...

. Karakhan was known for his dandyish appearance;

Karl Radek Karl Berngardovich Radek (; 31 October 1885 – 19 May 1939) was a revolutionary and writer active in the Polish and German social democratic movements before World War I and a Communist International leader in the Soviet Union after the Russian ...

is quoted as having "maliciously described" him as "the Ass of Classical Beauty", while a junior colleague, Alexander Barmine, wrote that "Our young staff gave him unstinted admiration, amazed that humanity could produce such perfection. He had a purity of profile such as is seen, as a rule, only on ancient coins." The British diplomat Robert Bruce Lockhart, who met Karakhan in 1918, described him as: On May 3, 1937, Karakhan was recalled to Moscow and arrested on charges of participating in a "pro-fascist conspiracy" to overthrow the Soviet Government. On September 20, 1937, he was sentenced to death by the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court. He was shot on the same day and became a victim of the

Great Purge The Great Purge, or the Great Terror (), also known as the Year of '37 () and the Yezhovshchina ( , ), was a political purge in the Soviet Union that took place from 1936 to 1938. After the Assassination of Sergei Kirov, assassination of ...

. Karakhan was posthumously rehabilitated in 1956. His third wife (in civil marriage), Marina Semyonova, the Soviet ballet dancer, died in 2010.

References

External links

Britannica article about Karakhan Manifesto
* 1889 births 1937 deaths Diplomats from Tbilisi People from Tiflis Governorate Georgian people of Armenian descent Mensheviks Mezhraiontsy Old Bolsheviks Ambassadors of the Soviet Union to China Ambassadors of the Soviet Union to Turkey Ambassadors of the Soviet Union to Poland Armenian revolutionaries Armenian atheists Executive Committee of the Communist International Treaty of Brest-Litovsk negotiators Tomsk State University alumni Great Purge victims from Armenia Soviet rehabilitations Russian revolutionaries Members of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union executed by the Soviet Union {{Russia-diplomat-stub