In late 1922, Mehmed Münir Bey (Ertegün), an international lawyer arrived at the Lausanne Conference in the capacity of legal advisor for the emergent Turkish state. His former colleague and superior, Gabriel Noradungian, an international lawyer who once served as the Ottoman Foreign Minister, represented Armenian interests at the same conference. Both men had worked for the Ottoman Foreign Ministry’s Office of Legal Counsel (isti?are odas?) – a Hamidian era office established in 1882 to deal with questions related to international law and international relations. The Office of Legal Counsel produced thousands of legal opinions related to public and private international law that were instrumental in the crafting late Ottoman diplomacy. Indeed, the Ottoman Foreign Ministry had relied upon international legal arguments to shore up territorial claims, and effective political control, across the empire - and international law was at the center of Ottoman diplomatic strategy vis-à-vis Europe. But how would international law figure into debates at Lausanne after warfare, not diplomacy, forced revision of the Treaty of Sèvres (1920)? This paper will examine the Ankara government’s use of international law at the Lausanne Peace Conference – particularly questions related the termination of foreign legal impairments on Ottoman sovereignty including the Capitulations. The paper will trace the shift from Ottoman diplomatic practice of preserving sovereignty by treaty to the Ankara government’s focus on ending foreign interference into the domestic affairs of the state. I will look at the work of Mehmed Münir who was deeply engaged in wartime diplomacy and peacemaking. He was a legal advisor for negotiations at Brest-Litovsk, for the Ottoman Delegation to the Paris Peace Conference, and after Lausanne attempted to negotiate for the return of Mosul at the League of Nations. He was also a key figure in establishing the new Foreign Ministry in the Turkish Republic.