On April 21, Faisal left for the East. Before leaving, Clemenceau sent a draft letter on April 17 in which the French government declared that it recognized „Syria`s right to independence in the form of a federation of autonomous governments, in accordance with the traditions and wishes of the population,“ stating that Faisal had recognized „that France is the power qualified to give the help of various advisers to Syria, which are necessary to put in order and achieve the progress demanded by the population. on April 1, Fayçal Clemenceau assured that he was „deeply impressed by the disinterested kindness of your statements towards me, while I was in Paris, and that he must thank you for having been the first to propose the sending of the Interallied Commission, which will soon leave for the East to determine the wishes of the local peoples regarding the future organization of their country. The Franco-English agreement was confirmed in an exchange of letters on 9 and 16 May. [37] In November 1915, Georges-Picot, first secretary of the French embassy in London (former long-time French consul in Beirut and loyal to the Colonial Party), presented in November 1915 to an inter-departmental committee of British undersecretarys of state a maximum version of France`s claims to Greater Syria. He then negotiated exclusively with Mark Sykes, a Conservative MP and War Office representative in committee. The two men reached a first agreement in January 1916 and were slightly modified in February 1916. Sykes did not achieve his goal of annexing to a British sphere the entire area south of a line between Haifa in Palestine and Kirkuk in present-day northern Iraq. .
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