RECOGNITION FOR ALBANIA

Timaru Herald, Volume CLVIII, Issue 23392, 26 December 1945, Page 3

RECOGNITION FOR ALBANIA

Country’s Struggle For Freedom Young Government’s Trials

The announcement that the Great Powers have decided to recognise the Albanian Government has brought the smal'est of our Allies into the news for a lightning flash of time, writes Bertha Gaster in the "News-Chronicle." It was just a year ago, on November 17 1944 that the last German retreated from Tirana. Eleven days later the Provisional Government of the Albanian Resistance Movement entered the capital and formally took control of the country. It has been undisputed masters ever since. But, unlike the regimes of other liberated countries, little has been heard of it for a long tl ™ven the British Government has been in doubt. When the new Albanian Government asked for recognition bv the Great Powers last winter Mr E*den replied in the House that His Majesty’s Government did not consider itself in possession of sufficient inform ation to comply with this request. And most people, feeling equally ignorant, probably had a sneaking sympathy with H None the less, the result of this ignorance and lack of interest, added to the ambiguous diplomatic position of Albania at the outbreak of the war, was that this small independent country the last victim of pre-war Fascist aggression, went unrecognised by the Great Powers for a -whole year. Admittedly Albania is small enough to be overlooked. It is a tiny mountainous country no bigger than Wales sandwiched between Yugoslavia and Greece on the Adriatic coast, controlling from the east the highly important straits to the Adriatic. The population, mainly Moslem, is. 1,009.000 all told. Lovers cf f reedom

They are hardy, primitive mountaineers living among inaccessible ranges where tribal law and the blood feud are only beginning to die out, or in small stone-built towns, the largest no bi° ger than a provincial English suburb, fierce, freedom-loving, desperately P °The brief history of their independence since Albania was admitted to the League of Nations in 1920, runs through some 15 years of uneasy dictatorship under King Zog, and ended one sunny Easter morning m 1939, when the little ports of Valona and Durazzo woke to see grey Italian warships standing off the harbour, and learnt their days of freedom were over. Quisling Governments followed, but there were sporadic ambushes and attacks by patriots even during the first two years of Italian occupation. It was only by the end of 1941, however, when the Italians were forced to transfer the bulk of their armies there to harder-pressed fronts elsewhere, that the definite bands which formed the nuclei of the resistance movements began to operate. The pattern of Albanian resistance follows in almost every respect the Yuogslav struggle, both ideologically and from a military point of view. Small bands linked into a movement. No outside help came until 1943, with generous-British assistance afterwards. A Right Wing and a Lieft Wing group, distinguishable from the first. The Right Wing was supported by a number of old and respected politicians who had never accepted the Italian occupation. The Left Wing, as in Yugoslavia, was started by a group of near-Communists in the spring of 1942. Italian officers who lounged in and out of a little general store in Tirana little guessed that the dark round-faced young man who served them so politely was the mainspring of an underground movement that was to control most of the country, before their final collapse came In two points they differed. Albania was the only country in Europe that had no Communist Party, legal or underground, before the war, to give a skeleton shape to the w'ork. The Albanian Communist Party, in tact, was founded at the same time as active resistance got under way. Secondly, unlike the Mihailovich faction m Yugoslavia, the Right Wing loyally fought the Italians until the enemy collapse in 1943, and a joint agreement between the two movements was reached at Peza in September, 1942, at which it was agreed to form a joint National Liberation Front. When the Italians collapsed the Germans, came, and, under the specious argument of a purely temporary military occupation, and the promise of independence won over most of the Right Wing to full collaboration. This left the partisans under Enver Hoxha the sole focus of resistance in the country, and the only movement enjoying the support and assistance of the British. Large tracts of country were liberated.

Young Government It is a young, untried Government. Most of its members are between 30 and 40 years of age, the intellectuals who have been educated at the American School at Tirana and at Paris. Rome or Vienna. Most are from the south, where the fighting was fiercest and where the Partisans enjoy their greatest support. Three at least are Communists, headed by Enver Hoxha (pronounced Hodja), 35, educated in Paris and Brussels, schoolmaster at Korce. thrown out for his liberal opinions when the Italians took over, and shopkeeper for a living until the guerrilla war got under way. Alike in war, alike in peace. The new Albanian regime shows the same ideals, the same form of organisation, and lies under the same type of criticism as Tito's Government in Belgrade. Village and regional councils, Youtn Movement and Anti-Fascist Womens Movement, led by young men and women outstanding in guerrilla days, concentrate on social reform, care of the wounded, combating illiteracy, and the hundred and one jobs of propaganda shock troops. Land reform, long overdue, has been drastic, more drastic than in Yugoslavia. The big estates of the Turkish educated landowners and tribal chieftains have been confiscated and divided among the peasants in five-hectare lots. • At the same time a high Excess Profits Tax on war profits has greatly reduced the power of the merchant class, besides putting money in the Government excheauer. Reconstruct tion goes on as best it can, but there are still hundreds of ruined villages in the south, food is scarce in many regions, and transport is the same crying necessity as in other war-torn countries. Politically, Albania is closely allied to Yugoslavia—the only country to recognise its Government before November 10—and sympathetically at least belongs to the Left Wing Balkan bloc.