Czernin, Ottokar, Graf

Related Category: Austria and Hungary, History: Biographies

(ô´tōkär gräf chĕr´nĭn), 1872–1932, Austro-Hungarian foreign minister. He was an adviser to Archduke Francis Ferdinand. As foreign minister (1916–18) he sought a negotiated peace, but was unwilling to abandon Austrian war aims in Italy and the Balkans. He was one of the negotiators of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk. Czernin was dismissed after the private peace-making attempts of Emperor Charles I, extended through Prince Sixtus of Bourbon-Parma, were dramatically disclosed by the French premier, Clemenceau.