[ALBSA-Info] An article by a "doctor"

[Agron Alibali]

>From the Albanian Daily News

The Myth of Greater Albania

By Dr Sam Vaknin

To the politicians of the Balkans - almost without
exception corrupt and despised by their own
constituencies - the myth of a Greater Albania comes
in handy. It keeps the phobic Macedonians, the
disdainful Serbs and the poor and crime-ridden
Albanians united and submissive within their
respective countries, although each group for
differing reasons.

To reiterate, it is the belief that people of Albanian
extraction, wherever they may be, regard their
domicile as part of a Greater Albania and undertake
all efforts necessary to create such an outcome. For
example, Kosovo should be part of this Greater
Albania, so the myth goes, because prior to 1912, when
the Serbs occupied it, Kosovo had administratively
been part of an Ottoman-mandated Albania. Sali Berisha
- a former president of Albania - talks ominously
about an "Albanian Federation." The younger, allegedly
more urbane Pandeli Majko, the former Prime Minister
of Albania, has raised the notion of a uniform
curriculum for all Albanian pupils and students,
wherever they may reside. Albanians in Macedonia make
it a point to fly Albanian flags conspicuously and on
every opportunity. This could have well been a
plausible scenario had it not been for two facts.
Firstly, there is no such thing as homogeneous
"Albanians" and secondly Greater Albania is without
historical precedent.

Albanians are comprised of a few ethnic groups of
different creeds. There are Catholic Albanians - such
as Mother Theresa - and Muslim Albanians - such as
Hashim Thaci, the self-proclaimed "provisional Prime
Minister" of Kosovo. There are Tosks - southern
Albanians who speak a (nasal) dialect of Albanian and
there are Gegs - northern Albanians (and Kosovars) who
speak another dialect which has little in common with
Tosk (at least to my ears). Tosks don’t like Gegs and
Gegs detest Tosks. In a region where tribal and
village loyalties predominate, these are pertinent and
important facts.

The Kosovars are considered by their Albanian
"brethren" (especially by the Tosks, but also by
Albanian Gegs) to be cold, unpleasant, filthy-rich
cheats. Albanians - Tosks and Gegs alike - are
considered by the Kosovars to be primitive,
ill-mannered bandits. There is no love lost between
all these groups. When the crisis brought on by
Operation Allied Force started, the local Albanian
population charged the refugees exorbitant (not to say
extortionate) prices for such necessities as a roof
over their head, food and cigarettes. When the UN
mandate (read: the KLA mandate) was established, the
Albanians rushed to export their brand of crime and
banditry to Kosovo and to prey on its local
population.

No Macedonian - however radical - will dare speak
about the Albanians in the way that my Kosovar
contacts do. They nonchalantly and matter-of-factly
attribute to them the most heinous crimes and
uncivilized behaviour. Kosovars had an excruciating
experience in Albania during this crisis. The lessons
learned by Kosovars since Albania was opened up to
them in 1990 will not be easily forgotten nor
forgiven. Albanians reciprocate by portraying the
Kosovars as cynical, inhuman, money-making terminators
and emotionless wealthy predators.

This is not to say that Albanians on both sides of the
border do not share the same national dreams and
aspirations. Kosovar intellectuals were watching
Albanian TV and reading Albanian papers even
throughout the Stalinist period of Enver Hoxha, the
long-time Albanian dictator. Albanian nationalists
never ceased regarding Kosovo as an integral part of
an Albanian motherland. But as the decades passed by,
as the dialects metamorphosed, as the divide grew
wider, as the political systems diverged and as the
political and cultural agendas became more distinct -
Kosovars became more and more Kosovars and less and
less like the Albanians of Albania proper.

This historical, 80-year-old rift was exacerbated by
the abyss between the Enver Hoxha regime and its Tito
counterpart; the former impoverished, paranoiac,
xenophobic, hermetically isolated and violent; the
latter - relatively enlightened, economically
sprightly, open to the world and dynamic. As a result,
Kosovar houses are three times as big as Albanian ones
and Kosovars used to be (until the Kosovo conflict)
three times richer (in terms of GDP per capita).

Kosovars crossing into Albania during the Hoxha regime
were often jailed and tortured by its fearsome secret
police. A Kosovar - Xhaferr Deva - served as Minister
of the Interior in the hated Second World War
government in Albania, which collaborated
wholeheartedly with the Nazis. Albanians, in general,
were much more reserved and suspicious towards the
Germans (who occupied Albania from 1943, after the
Italian change of heart). Kosovars welcomed the Nazis
as liberators from Serb serfdom (as did Albanians in
Macedonia to a lesser extent). Deva was responsible
for the most unspeakable atrocities against the
Albanian population in Albania proper. It did not
render the Kosovars more popular. In Albania proper,
three anti-fascist resistance movements - the Albanian
Communist Party, Balli Kombetar (the National Front)
and Legaliteti (Legality, a monarchist faction
fighting to re-establish King Zog) fought against the
occupiers from 1941. The Communists seized control of
the country at the end of 1944.

Thus, the forced re-union was a culture shock to both.
The Kosovars were stunned by the living conditions,
misery and lawlessness of Albania proper. The
Albanians were envious and resentful of their guests
and regarded them as legitimate objects for
self-enrichment. There were, needless to say, selfless
exceptions to the egotistic rule. But I cannot think
of any right now.

Historically, there was never a "Greater Albania" to
hark back to. Albania was created in 1912 (its borders
finally settled in 1913) in response to
Austro-Hungarian demands. It never encouraged Kosovo
to secede. 

The Albanian King Zog suppressed the activities of
Kosovar irredentist movements in his country in
between the two world wars. Albania, mired in the twin
crises of economy and identity, had little mind or
heart for Kosovo.

But this was the culmination of a much longer,
convoluted and fascinating history



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