Mevlanzade Rifat Bey

Mevlanzade Rifat Bey (1869 in Constantinople – 1930 in Aleppo), was an Ottoman Kurdish journalist and poet.

[1] Mevlanzade's father was Abdurrahman Nacim Efendi who was born in the Şehrizor district of Süleymaniye, Abdurrahman entered into the Ottoman civil service and became head of Diyarbakır Province Court and later head of the Beirut Court of Appeals, he was also a poet and died in Harpoot in 1895.

[3] Mevlanzade Rifat Bey was one of the most notable and widely read journalists of the Ottoman Empire.

He was an opponent in three different periods, firstly against Abdul Hamid II, secondly against Committee of Union and Progress and thirdly against Mustafa Kemal Atatürk.

Mevlanzade was also a prominent member of the Society for the Elevation of Kurdistan, and defended the Fourteen Points by Woodrow Wilson, according to which the rights of all nationalities within the Ottoman Empire are to be considered.