Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Abdul Wahab Khan Tarzi

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep. It appears that he's - just - verifiable enough, and notable as acting foreign minister. Sandstein 16:41, 8 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Abdul Wahab Khan Tarzi

Questionable notability, orphan. JaGa^talk 21:46, 29 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Keep, being the foreign minister of a country would tend to confer notability. Stifle (talk) 22:19, 29 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Academics and educators-related deletion discussions. —David Eppstein (talk) 22:56, 29 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Afghanistan-related deletion discussions. -- • Gene93k (talk) 00:24, 30 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. The claim of being foreign minister fails WP:V, I could not find a single independent source to support it. There are sources such as the Tarzi Family Historical Society, which seems like a vanity organization. As for being an officer of the Legion of Honour of France, there are 10,000 such Officers. As an academic, I could not find anything to suggest the he passes WP:PROF.--Eric Yurken (talk) 03:03, 30 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. Stifle, you should know better. It doesn't matter if the individual is a head of state, we deal in a little technicality known as "verifiability". I looked for a little while and I can find no second party sources that either confirm or deny the subject's identity. Were such sources to be available, then of course he would be notable just due to his position. But as it stands now, a lack of sources means that the article goes away until such a thing is available. Perhaps someone who understands the intricacies of this region's names could sniff out any possible variations that might lead to a credible source? Trusilver 08:14, 30 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Question. Given that he is supposed to have been foreign minister in the 1920s of a country like Afghanistan, that is much less "wired" to the Internet than most Western countries, I'd be surprised if there were online verifiable sources. Did the people above saying they can't find any sources look for anything NOT online? --Crusio (talk) 08:43, 30 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- If he was indeed Foreign Affairs Minister of Afghanistan, it would not have been so hard to find some independent evidence on the Internet, even today. For example, this history site states that: “In April 1929 Afghan Foreign Minister Ghulam Sidiq Khan visited Berlin.” The site mentions another Tarzi, Mahmud Tarzi, as Foreign Affairs Minister of Afghanistan in 1919. This is another family member, who I believe easily passes WP:BIO.--Eric Yurken (talk) 16:49, 30 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  - The article and site says he was acting Foreign Minister, not Foreign Minister. I think that is enough for notability, but the temporariness could make it hard to confirm with any but exhaustive and obscure off-line sources, especially for a country like Afghanistan. For comparison, we don't have articles on all the acting US Secretaries of State, e.g. Kenneth Rush, see List of Secretaries of State of the United States.John Z (talk) 06:45, 2 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Weak keep, but should be improved. He seems to have been head of the country's tourist bureau for some years and served at least in the diplomatic corps if not as foreign minister. One source says he was the son of Mahmud Tarzi. Searching is partly hampered by name variants; I get the most hits on Google Books using "Abdul Wahab Tarzi". --Delirium (talk) 21:31, 30 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so consensus may be reached.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Foxy Loxy ^Pounce! 01:09, 3 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Keep Found several mentions, including [1] which would probably not be RS, but which serves to confirm notability. I suspect that the Istanbul University link would be fruitful in getting real info on him. Collect (talk) 16:11, 3 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Keep Foreign Ministers, even ones for a short period, are notable. I consider Acting ministers to be in that class; they exercise the functions of the office. DGG (talk) 01:04, 5 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Tentative keep. Searching Google Books with "Abdul Wahab Tarzi" comes up with a number of references, most of which can't be accessed online, but several snippets confirm that he was prominent in the Afghan tourist office, one names him as the son of Mahmud Tarzi and another as a prominent student who was unusual in studying in England. An article on Mahmud Tarzi in the Middle East Journal[2] states "In Afghanistan, until recently, the study of Tarzi's career and ideas was discouraged, apparently in view of his close family ties and political association with King Amunullah Khan (1919-1928) and his ill fated reforms. Thus, until the late 1950's Afghan official sources omitted any mention of the name Tarzi." -- which might explain the dearth of official sources confirming his son's foreign office position. If anyone can access the article via JSTOR this might be a good reliable source. Espresso Addict (talk) 12:39, 5 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.