[ALBSA-Info] The Cham issue

[Agron Alibali]

>From the ICG's report on Albania

.......
The Cham Issue
Now that Kosovo has effectively been 'liberated', many
Albanians feel that it is time to turn their
attentions to that other great national concern - the
restitution of property rights of the Cham people. The
Chams are the ethnic Albanian, and predominantly
Muslim, population of the region of north-eastern
Greece known to all Albanians as Chameria - an area of
Epirus extending between Butrint and the mouth of the
Acheron river, and eastward to the Pindus mountains.
The name 'Chameria' comes from the ancient Illyrian
name for the Thyamis river, which traversed the
territory of the ancient Illyrian tribe of Tesprotes.
Chameria was part of the Roman Empire before being
conquered by Byzantium. After the Ottoman invasion in
the 15th century the mostly Albanian population of
northern Chameria - from Konispol to the Gliqi river -
converted to Islam, whilst those living south of the
Gliqi down to Preveza Bay remained Orthodox
Christians. In 1913 the Ambassador's Conference
allotted the Chameria region to Greece, so today only
seven Cham villages, centred on the village of
Konispol, are in Albania itself.
Between 1921 and 1926, the Greek government set about
trying to deport Albanian Muslims from Chameria in
order to allot their lands to Greeks who had been
deported from Asia Minor during Kemal Ataturk's
revolution.24 In an attempt, in 1944, to establish an
ethnically pure border region, the Greek government
unleashed a campaign in Chameria, which resulted in
around 35,000 Chami fleeing to Albania and others to
Turkey. The Greek authorities then approved a law
sanctioning the expropriation of Cham property, citing
the collaboration of their community with the
occupying German forces as a main reason for the
decision. The law is still in force in Greece.
Whatever the truth of this allegation, which has to an
extent been supported by some of the British Liaison
Officers based with the Greek Resistance movements25 ,
the forced movement of the entire population has left
a lingering sense of injustice amongst Albanians in
general, which has contributed to continuing poor
bilateral relations between Albania and Greece.

The Cham issue has remained dormant with none of the
post-war Albanian governments venturing to make it a
key issue in relations with its southern neighbour.
Today, the issue is seen - as was Kosovo, as one more
'historical injustice' suffered by the Albanian people
that has to be corrected. After the collapse of
Communism, the Chams in Albania set up the `Chameria
Association' dedicated to the return of their
expropriated lands in Greece. The then Greek foreign
minister, Karolas Papoulias, said in the summer of
1991 that a bilateral commission should settle these
demands. The chances of forming one, however, are very
slim since under current Greek law there is no legal
means of challenging requisition (or expropriation) of
land by the Greek state. In the meantime, the issue
has been taken by the Tirana government to the
International Court of Justice, in an effort to secure
financial compensation for lost Cham property. There
has been little progress to date.

Since the end of the Kosovo conflict, support for the
Chams has grown ever more vocal. The Chameria
Association is successfully wooing support to the Cham
cause, and is even working on legal procedures to sue
the Greek government at the European Court of Human
Rights. The Chams are frustrated and angered by the
Greek government's refusal to discuss their demands.
During the recent meeting between the new Albanian
Premier Ilir Meta and his Greek counterpart Costas
Simitis, a controversy arose when Simitis, answering
to questions from journalists at a joint press
conference, said that the Greek government considered
the Cham issue as a closed chapter.26

Back in Tirana, the opposition DP lost no time
entering the fray, accusing Premier Meta of signing an
alleged agreement with the Greeks over coverage of the
Cham issue in Albanian history books.27 The prevailing
perception was that this was a clear attempt to erase
the issue from the minds of future Albanian students.
At the end of December, the Chairman of the Foreign
Parliamentary Committee, Sabri Godo, urged the
International Court of Human Rights, as well as the
Albanian authorities to work out with Greece a
solution to the property rights of the Chams.28
According to a spokesman for the Cham Association in
Tirana, the total value of Cham property at the end of
the World War II was estimated at 340 million USD,
whilst the current market value could reach 2.5
billion USD. The Cham Association wants to see the 60
year old Greek law authorising the confiscation of
Cham property to be declared null and void, and the
Cham people fully compensated for their loss, thus
paving the way for "better and more just relations
between Albania and Greece."29

On a recent tour of southern Albania, DP leader Sali
Berisha threatened to put relations with Greece on
hold if it did not comply with two key demands: more
cultural rights for the Albanians living in Greece,
and the resolution of the property issue of the Cham
population expelled from Greece after the Second World
War. In a rally in the southern town of Saranda,
Berisha told supporters that Greece should open an
Albanian language school in the northern Greek town of
Filiates, and warned that without a solution to the
Cham properties issue relations between the two
countries would remain stagnant. He also vowed that a
solution to the Cham issue would be a precondition for
better relations with Greece if and when his party
comes to power.30

A growing number of Albanians feel that now is the
time, in the wake of the world's acknowledgement of
the human rights abuses in Kosovo, for the Albanian
government to direct the international community's
attention to the plight of the Chams. The independent
daily Koha Jone applauded Premier Meta for bringing up
the Cham issue in his discussions with Costas Simitis.
The paper concluded that for the first time in the
history of Greek-Albanian relations, a Socialist
Premier had openly objected to Athens' preferred
position of ignoring the whole issue of the Cham's
property claims.

It seems certain that calls to re-instate the property
rights of the Cham population will be a growing
concern for official Albanian policy. With the
widespread and increasingly indignant support of both
left and right in Albania, this is clearly an issue
that is not going to go away

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