By 1877 , Ismail seemed to be on the brink of important functions in the Ottoman administration , but when Sultan Abdulhamid II dismissed Midhat as prime minister , Ismail Qemali was sent into exile in western Anatolia , though the Sultan later recalled him and made him governor of Beirut . Qemali in 1892 presented the sultan with a plan for a Balkan Confederation . It involved an entente between Balkan states and the empire eventually bound by mutual defense and economic development of resources agreements within a unified Great Eastern state with Turkey as its centre and return of old borders . In this framework , Albania like Macedonia was not treated as a separate state but as part of Turkey . In time his liberal policy recommendations caused him to fall out of favour with the Sultan again . Qemali was aware that the empire came close to intervention from the Great Powers due to the Armenian crisis of 1895 . Abdulhamid II awarded Qemali the position of governor ( vali ) of Tripoli , however he viewed the high post as exile . In May 1900 Ismail Qemali boarded the British ambassador 's yacht , claimed asylum and conveyed out of the empire were for the next eight years he lived in exile . Qemali left for Athens and issued proclamations explaining his abandonment of service to the empire while Ottoman authorities were upset with his flight . His interest toward the Albanian question was limited until these events and Qemali 's participation in the Albanian national movement was seen as an asset among Albanian circles who would bring prestige and influence Muslim Albanians to support the cause . He also worked to promote constitutional rule in the Ottoman Empire . In Paris he met Faik Konitza and the two leaders worked together for a short time on Albanian issues through newspaper publications where Qemali called for Albanian unity , economic development , progress and to warn of future dangers of subjugation by Balkan states . The pair fell out as Qemali found Konitza difficult to work with while Konitza found his focus of being a politician overwhelming and disapproved of his pro-Greek policy . Qemali went on to found the newspaper '' Selamet '' ( Salvation ) published in Ottoman Turkish , Albanian and Greek which called for cooperation between Albanians and Greeks , due to both peoples having the same geopolitical interests . Some Albanian activists involved in the national movement considered those views as suspicious and an instrument of Greek policy causing his popularity to wane among Albanians
Armenian crisis of 1895
Massacres of Diyarbakır (1895)
Ismail Qemali