One of the most important of these groups was Balli Kombëtar, a nationalist organization led by Mit'hat Frashëri and Ali Këlcyra.

In mid-1943 the Special Operations Executive (SOE), a British clandestine organisation, sent several agents to Albania to cooperate with Balli Kombëtar and the Albanian National Liberation Front.

David Smiley, one of the SOE agents, contacted a unit of two hundred Balli Kombëtar soldiers under the command of Qemal Burimi.

[1] Shortly afterwards a large German troop-carrier towing an 88 mm gun approached and was blown up on one of the two groups of mines.

The German soldiers that were not killed by the explosion were shot by the Ballists while they were trying to escape by running back along the road.