[ALBSA-Info] Xavier Raufer

[Kreshnik Bejko]

The Albanian Mafia

Xavier Raufer on Radio Netherlands



The ethnic Albanian rebels fighting in the hills of Macedonia are the 
paramilitary wing of an Albanian Mafia exporting drugs and trafficking 
humans to Europe and even further. That's according to research by a leading 
criminologist in France, Xavier Raufer. He says the home base of Albanian 
refugees from the Kosovo conflict is in these areas. This diaspora has 
secured a safe power base for the mafia to efficiently carry out its 
smuggling and human trafficking.

Xavier Raufer is the author of a book entitled 'The Albanian Mafia". In his 
view, there's no way to distinguish Albanian guerrillas from local mafia 
groups. They have the same mindset and share the same goals, he said in an 
interview with Radio Netherlands' Lorenza Bacino.

"There's not such a thing as rebels and militias on the one hand and the 
Albanian mafia on the other. In the Albanian world -- in Albania and in 
Kosovo and in the Albanian-populated part of Macedonia -- you have clans and 
in those clans you have a mix of young men fighting for the cause of 
national liberation, young men belonging to the mafia, young men driving 
their cousins or other girls from the village into prostitution. It's 
absolutely impossible to distinguish between them. They obey the same clans, 
they have the same logic, the same world view, and to discriminate between 
one guy who's one day selling heroin and the next day fighting in the 
mountains is absolutely impossible."

Political Alibi
Mr Raufer draws a comparison between the current ethnic turmoil in Macedonia 
and the recent situation in South Lebanon. In both cases, society is 
dominated by clans engaged in all sorts of criminal activity. In Mr Raufer's 
view, the claims by Albanian rebels that they are standing up for the rights 
of the ethnic Albanian minority in Macedonia is just an excuse for criminal 
activities.

"It may be true for half or one third of the day. In South Lebanon some 
years ago, when you asked those South Lebanese villagers: is this village 
Amal or Hizbollah, the guy would just laugh and say: the village is Amal by 
day and Hizbollah by night. In Albania, it's the same situation. You have to 
be as ignorant as Europe or NATO not to discover that. The guys are 
liberation fighters by day and sell heroin by night or vice versa. It's 
absolutely impossible to discriminate between the two activities."

Mafia Bastion
The recent fighting has concentrated around the western town of Tetovo. This 
comes as no surprise to Mr Raufer, who describes it as a key mafia bastion.

"It's of major importance. Each time the police or the foreign powers' 
intelligence in Kosovo (the US army, the British army and the French army 
each have their own intelligence) discover a mafia network, i.e. a network 
selling forbidden goods, like petrol to Yugoslavia when there is an embargo 
or selling prostitutes to Italy or selling heroin, you see that the head of 
the network is in Tetovo. It's extremely easy to understand why. This part 
of Macedonia is absolutely out of any type of regular control and it has 
been for years. The state of Macedonia is very feeble. It is not a strong 
power. It only has limited resources to maintain law and order in the part 
of Macedonia that's populated by ethnic Macedonians and no way at all of 
controlling the country's Albanian-populated areas. So, in Tetovo, they are 
free to do whatever they like, no one can arrest them."

International Ignorance
Meanwhile, the Macedonian government has launched an all-out offensive and 
there've been some bellicose statements from NATO and the international 
community. According to Mr Raufer, it shows that international bodies like 
the EU, the UN or NATO are hardly aware of the real situation on the ground.

"It's worse than that. In order to achieve even a modest success against 
criminalised guerrillas like the UCK, you don't need an army. An army is 
absolutely hopeless. A criminal society like the mafia is absolutely 
invincible. They don't show on any radar. You cannot see them. So, what you 
need is a "gendarmerie" or a police force of some 12,000 people, who know 
how to arrest criminals. You don't need an army of soldiers who are used to 
do battle with guns and tanks and planes."





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