Former intelligence head dies

TIRANA, Oct 26 – Bashkim Gazidede, who led Albania’s secret service after communism fell and commanded the security forces during a 1997 state of emergency, died of lung cancer in Tirana. He was 56.
Prime Minister Sali Berisha and other top officials paid their last respects on Sunday.
Gazidede is survived by his wife, a son and a daughter.
“He made a great contribution in the fight against international terrorism and led the fight for quelling the communist rebellion in 1997,” said Berisha, who had nominated him in the post when he was president in 1992 until 1997.
One of Berisha’s most trusted men, he was given special powers under a state of emergency to crush a rebellion and restore order as anarchy, sparked by the collapse of sham pyramid investment schemes, spread all over Albania in 1997.
Gazidede fled Albania in 1997 and returned shortly after Berisha came to power in 2005.
Albania’s leftist opposition accused Gazidede’s secret service of manipulating elections in 1996 and beating their supporters during a protest in central Tirana’s Skanderbeg square.