TIRANA, May 4 – Fatmir Xhindi, 49, legislator of the main opposition Socialist Party, was killed Saturday late evening at the courtyard of his house in Roskovec near Fier, 100 kilometers south of capital Tirana.
The opposition Socialists have demanded Albanian authorities to hunt down those guilty of their lawmaker’s killing about two months before the national elections.
“We want clarification of the event,” Socialist leader Edi Rama said, but declined to comment further on the killing. “It’s a very grave event to come out with fast conclusions and comments.”
Thousands of Albanians, politicians, Socialist Party leaders, Prime Minister Sali Berisha and President Bamir Topi paid their last respects to the late legislator.
“It would be good for God to be here to fight the darkness and crime, to help justice do justice,” said Rama before Xhindi’s corpse was laid to rest at the cemetery of his birthplace, Kurjan village near Roskovec.
Roskovec town hall council declared him an Honored Citizen.
Police are investigating and have offered a 250,000 Euros reward for information leading to the killers, but they have not said if they found any motive for killing the 49-year-old lawmaker.
Opposition Socialists have refrained from making statements about whether the killing could have been politically motivated.
Xhindi is the second legislator to be killed in Albania since the 1990 fall of the Balkan country’s communist regime, after lawmaker Azem Hajdari of the Democrats, then in opposition, was killed in September 1998. The killing led Democratic Party supporters to protest for days and seize government offices and the public television broadcaster.
Xhindi was serving his third term in Parliament.
Albania, a NATO member as of last month, holds parliamentary elections on June 28th.
The Socialist party canceled all its public activities Monday.
Berisha denounced the killing and assured “that the government will do its utmost to find the perpetrators as soon as possible and bring them to the justice.”
“It was an ugly act which shocked not only his family, co-citizens and colleagues but the whole of Albania and Albanians,” said Berisha after paying his respects to the family. “I assured (the family) that the government would do their utmost to find the black-hand, the author or the authors who executed the legislator.”
President Bamir Topi also called for swift justice in the case.
European Union Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn also reacted to the murder.
“I strongly condemn the murder of Fatmir Xhindi. I offer my sincere condolences to his family and friends. I call on the Albanian authorities to investigate this crime thoroughly and bring the perpetrator to justice,” he said.
Though not directly linking it to a political motivation, opposition Socialists have refused to rule out a political motive in Xhindi’s murder.
“This is a premeditated murder and justice should find those responsible for this very serious criminal act,” said Socialist leader Edi Rama after visiting the scene of the crime.
Gramos Ruci, a high-ranking Socialist party official, said: “A possibility that political motives are behind Xhindi’s murder should not be excluded.”
Socialist officials also condemned what they said was the lack of security and stability in Albania.
Top ranking experts of police and prosecutor’s offices are working in the small town of Roskovec and are trying to identify the causes of Xhindi’s death.
No results to find perpetrators of Xhindi’s killing
FIER, May 6 – More than 100 experts from police and prosecutor’s office have been involved in the attempt to discover who was the killer of the late Socialist party lawmaker Fatmir Xhindi last weekend.
Unfortunately there is still no result, at least made public.
Top policeman Ahmet Prenci said that Xhindi was shot from one person from some seven meters and then again at a closer distance after he had gone out of his car at his house. Some 30 persons have been questioned.
But Prenci declined to say any cause of the killing.
Xhindi’s brothers have also denied they have had any property disputes.
