History of Post-Communist Albania
Following a raid on an army training camp in which two Albanian conscripts were killed, Tirana arrests five ethnic Greeks, finds them guilty of espionage and illegal possession of weapons, and sentences them to between six and eight years in prison.
Angered by the verdict, (the court was being held behind closed doors, no international observers were allowed) Athens reportedly expels as many as 70,000 of the 300,000 illegal Albanian immigrants living in Greece.
Fatos Nano is convicted of embezzling state funds during his premiership in 1991 and sentenced to 12 years' imprisonment; the ruling is upheld by an appeals court in the following month.
Ramiz Alia is tried on a number of charges, including forced deportation of political prisoners, summary executions, and the upholding of the 1967 ban on religious activity.
Among the 49 new legislative decisions approved by the People's Assembly in 1995 are land and property laws that positively affect the flow of domestic and foreign investments, especially in the field of agriculture.
Following the collapse of several "get-rich-quick" pyramid schemes, in which hundreds of thousands of Albanians lost their life savings, enraged investors go on the rampage in the southern town of Lushnjë.
The UN Security Council approves dispatching a multinational military force to Albania to oversee the distribution of international humanitarian aid and maintain order.
He, two ex-interior ministers - Hekuran Isai (1982–89, 1990–91) and Simon Stefani (1989–90) - and the ex-chief prosecutor were acquitted on October 20 of killing 58 people who attempted to flee the country illegally between 1990 and 1992.
Prosecutors dropped the charges following a supreme court ruling that 32 other senior ex-communists could not be held liable for alleged offenses which had not been a crime at the time.
The Albanian Foreign Ministry repeatedly charges Yugoslavia with border violations that include shelling and sniping and with conducting massacres of Kosovo's civilian population.
Prime Minister Nano resigns after failing to get the backing of his coalition for a cabinet reshuffle in the wake of the outbreak of political violence two weeks ago.
In addition, within the framework of the NATO air campaign, U.S. forces deploy 24 Apache antitank helicopters and long-range artillery pieces in northern Albania.
With the end of the fighting, Albania's relations improve with its neighbours - Montenegro, Macedonia, Greece, and the new UN administration in Kosovo, with whom the Albanian Foreign Ministry plans a series of joint regional development projects within the framework of the European Union-funded Stability Pact for South Eastern Europe.
NATO says it will supply long-term military aid to Albania and Macedonia and draw up plans to help the two Balkan countries meet the alliance's entry requirements.
Poçi subsequently manages to break up 12 criminal gangs throughout the country, most notably those in Tropojë, where special police units restore order in September.
It is reported that the government has shifted its attention away from the construction of the east–west trunk road "Corridor 8," designed to link the South Balkans to the Adriatic, and is instead focusing on an internal north–south highway.
Numerous projects designed to enhance cooperation between Albania and other southeastern European countries in the fields of human rights, democracy, and security are launched.
The list does not include neighbouring Serbia and comes as part of a package of measures designed to encourage voters there to embrace reform and oust their federal president, Slobodan Milosevic.
Unemployment drops from 17.1% in 1999 to 13.3% in 2001, thanks to a government-supported job creation program that includes infrastructure-development projects within the framework of the Stability Pact for South Eastern Europe.
Although Albania has made strides toward democratic reform and maintaining the rule of law, serious deficiencies in the electoral code remain to be addressed, as demonstrated in the June 2001 parliamentary elections.
International observers judged the 2001 elections to be acceptable, but the Union for Victory Coalition, the second-largest vote recipient, disputed the results and boycotted parliament until January 31, 2002.
The Socialists re-elected Ilir Meta as Prime Minister in August 2001, a post which he held till February 2002, when he resigned due to party infighting.
The opposition had been split since 2000, when the New Democrat Party was formed, whose leader, Genc Pollo, charged Berisha with failing to offer convincing answers to the country's essential problems.
For his part, Prime Minister Meta pledges to upgrade power supplies, proceed with privatization, fight corruption and organized crime, improve ties with Western Europe and neighbours in the Balkan region, and promote free trade.
He has been accused of punching the editor-in-chief of Vizion Plus television, Ilir Babaramo, in a Tirana restaurant on October 14 because of criticism broadcast by the TV station two months ago.
Gramoz Ruci, a leading Socialist politician declared that unless Prime Minister Berisha abandons the idea of imposing himself he would "meet and face the people in the street.
"[12] In November protests begun in Tirana, led by opposition Socialist Party leader Edi Rama, against the allegedly rigged vote counting in the 2009 elections.
[13] The prime minister, Sali Berisha and opposition leader Edi Rama met in Strasbourg alongside representatives of the European Parliament in a business dinner to try and resolve their differences.
On May 8, Local elections ended with the victory of the Socialist Party of Albania (PS) in the main cities outside Tirana, Lezha and Shkodra;[24] The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe released a mixed evaluation of the electoral process, which was considered "competitive and transparent, but took place in an environment of high polarization and mistrust".
Then, the DP-led Central Electoral Commission decided to add to the count some of the votes misplaced in the wrong boxes, a move on doubtful legal grounds that was contested by the opposition[26][27][28] as well as by the OSCE.
