Recent Greek-Albanian relations

[taikou]

Since there seems to be Albanians also in this forum,it wouldn't be a bad idea to discuss recent developments in Greek-Albanian relations.

I wonder whether these would have any influence on the relations between the two countries...

1.Berisha's interview in last week's 'Vima',which caused strong reaction from certain circles in Albania.
2.The incident between supporters of PBDNJ(ethnic Greek party) and the local inhabitants.

[Ervald]

I think our relations are going pretty well.

Greek schools have been built in Albania, also the head of the church is greek to.

[Theodosivs]

1.Berisha's interview in last week's 'Vima',which caused strong reaction from certain circles in Albania.

The reaction was caused after rumor came out that Berisha, while speaking to the Greek PM, used the term "north epirus" when discussing the Greek minority. Others claim this was not so and he used "greek of our country". Pro-Greek circles, such as a certain Stavri Marko a Himara propagandist, took it.

I dont know what was said but I also dont trust Berisha's intelligence in such careful discussions. The man has a nasty habit of letting words slip out of his mouth. However from what I have heard so far it's just rumors.

2.The incident between supporters of PBDNJ(ethnic Greek party) and the local inhabitants.

Well picture this, imagine some pro-Albanians in Athens suddenly gathered without any warning and chanting the Albanian national anthem in the middle of the street as a protest. How would the police respond? The group that did it had not made any prior warning to their gathering and so the police took it as some illegal move, responding correctly in such an occasion.

[taikou]

The reaction was caused after rumor came out that Berisha, while speaking to the Greek PM, used the term "north epirus" when discussing the Greek minority. Others claim this was not so and he used "greek of our country". Pro-Greek circles, such as a certain Stavri Marko a Himara propagandist, took it.

I dont know what was said but I also dont trust Berisha's intelligence in such careful discussions. The man has a nasty habit of letting words slip out of his mouth. However from what I have heard so far it's just rumors.

I do think that much of what has been going around Berisha's words are nothing but rumors,too.What I learned about the speculation is, that medias reported Berisha saying to the interviewer that Cameria was 'technical ,not a national (issue)' ,which enraged the PDI.The original interview can't be read in the Vima's website so I can't really judge the exact nuance,but I assume that both Berisha and Mitsotakis simply avoided talking about it.As for Stavri Marko,I haven't heard about his involvement/connection in this...


Well picture this, imagine some pro-Albanians in Athens suddenly gathered without any warning and chanting the Albanian national anthem in the middle of the street as a protest. How would the police respond? The group that did it had not made any prior warning to their gathering and so the police took it as some illegal move, responding correctly in such an occasion.

Actually,I think the police had minimum involvement in this case.They simply got a report that there were violence,and went there to stop the people involved in the scuffles.It's interesting to note that Vangjel Dule claimed that no Greek anthems were sang,or no speeches were given in Greek.Whatever the case may be,I think the Albanian medias as well as the general public 'accepted' this case calmly/maturly(in contrast to the above case with Berisha),and no after-effects can be seen so far...Personally,I don't think this was any kind of 'ethnic' conflict,but much more of a 'mundane' nature.How the Greek medias react will be the point:if they ignore this case,then it surely is a no-ethnic conflict,but a scandal which is caused by one of the 2 major parties.

[Flipper]

I think the relations improve. There was a bad period that occured after the chaos in Albania back in 1996 if i'm correct. There is some racism because of that massive migration that occured which unfortunately included people that had escaped from the albanian jails during that period.

I believe things will improve even more later. If you look at it historically the relations have been more good than bad. Ok, you have some wars between the Molossians/Macedonians/Thesprotians and the Illyrians but in general the relations were foremost good back in the days. During Byzantine years, no problems.