By Marsida Gjoncaj
French scholar of modern history, Patrice Najbor recently published a book where he tries to give a different view on the history of Albania and its royal family. Najbor thinks that Esat Pash롔optani had his own strategy, when he handed Shkodra to the Montenegrins. In this case, Esat Pasha was not a traitor but a visionary man, since a few days after the Montenegrin king gave Shkodra back to the Albanians.
This is only one of the lines of Najbor’s book “The history of Albania and its royal family 1443-2007”, where the author tries to depict objectively the historic truth of Albania, based on outer and mostly unknown facts and persons. “I modestly tried to bring my own contribution in rewriting Albanian history, which has been much debated recently,” Najbor said.
The book structure consists of five volumes. The first volume is about the fight for independence, where the author mostly focused on the Great Powers influence in bringing Prince Wilhelm Wied in Albania (1914). The author also describes Esat Pash롔optani as a special character when writing, “When the World War I began, Esat Pasha lined up and fought with the allies and on the other hand he let the defeated Serbian army to pass through Albania, placing Albania on the line of the winners”.
Fan Noli dhe Ahmet Zogu
The second volume is about the 1920, focusing most on the two main figures of these period of time, Fan Noli and Ahmet Zogu. “Contrary to the common belief, Fan Noli was far from being a democrat. His Bolshevik government was walking towards dictatorship, since he did not keep his promise to organize fair elections. On the other hand Noli would say: “democracy is a hypocrite comedy, the parliament a morgue and free elections a real comedy”. So logically, if Noli was a democrat, than Zogu was supposed to be a dictator. But, instead he made his own way through the kingdom, by being in the first place minister of interior affairs, then a prime minister, president of the Republic and at the end the king of Albania, whose territories had been stolen away from it at the Conference of the Ambassadors in London 1913″ says Najbor. He also says that during his reign, king Zog founded a new modern, democratic and western country, being one of the most progressive statesmen of that time.
King’s Leka I efforts
On the third volume of his book, Najbor tries to describe the long and painful journey of the royal family in exile and the continuous fight of Leka’s I for Kosovo’s liberation. The fifth volume is full of unrevealed documents as a written proof of Leka’s political actions. “It is to be said that beyond any conflicts between Albanians, Leka continuously worked towards the unification of the Albanian nation”, writes Najbor. Further on this volume, Najbor explains that Prince Leka II is prepared to serve his country.
The return of the royal family
The fourth volume of the book is dedicated to the return of the royal family in Albania and to the general political situation in the 2000 in the region, where first Montenegro (2006) and then Kosovo (2008) declared their independence from Serbia. During these years, Sali Berisha came into power again (2005); Ramush Haradinaj was accused by the Hague tribunal of war crimes (2005), ratification by the parliament of the new law for the royal family (2003), signing of the Stabilization and Association Agreement with the EU (2006), Kosovo’s president Ibrahim Rugova passing away in 2006 and also the death of the queens Gerladin련2002) and Suzana (2004)
Archive documents
The fifth volume contains a lot of documents taken from the archive, such as international treaties, secret agreements, personal letters and even the genealogic tree of the royal family. Najbor thinks that by submitting such documents to the readers, anyone can create their own idea on the facts.
About the author
Patrice Najbor,
Graduate of the Institut d’Etudes des Relations Internationales (ILER) holds a Master of Diplomacy (Paris XI), Doctor of Science Policy, conducted a thesis on “Albania in international relations” (Paris – 1992) and several writings including “The system and security policy of Albania” and “The Albanian question in Kosovo” under a DEA in European Defense and Security (Lille – 1990). It has also organized and supported many humanitarian convoys in Albania during the transition to democracy. He is, moreover, the functions of adviser close to the Paris office of the Royal Court of Albania.
