USA: Berisha held elections
October 20 would have closed them sufficiently, but May 26 made them invalid
The Balkans in elections
1996 has been a year of elections for the Balkans. For the Balkans, it has been a year of electoral momentum, starting from Romania, Bulgaria, Yugoslavia and up to Albania, but for some countries it is the first time under pluralism and for others for decades, but without a standard. In Macedonia, with the initiative to register up to 400,000 Albanians, with nationalist direction in Turkey, with the stench of the right-wing government in Greece, and likewise with the victory of the socialists in Bulgaria, the Balkans of 1996 are entering a phase of new democratic confrontation. If we were asked to point to an election that chose the most uncertain outcome, we would single out Albania. Both in terms of timing and result. It was the last election in this year’s Balkans. But here, unlike other countries, with our gentle order, the whole post-Balkan scene had no clear ending, and the post-election period continues. On the eve of this year’s elections in Albania, the entire institutional body was feverish, from the central election commission to the presidium. Or perhaps even parliament was electoral in its four-year closing. It later happened, but without losing any of the nationalism of the others, that Berisha made his own elections for Albania. Ask whether they place it among the “gentle” of the entire post-Balkan world? Or were the post- matters also electoral? May 26, 1996 marked not so much a victory as a demonstration of the seizure of the state by a political force. This is not an opposition judgment but a definition, for which the international factor speaks in more measured language, not troubling the allies of the West. That is at least how the advanced Western countries see it, of course not the local governments of Albanian grandeur. Now it can be said with certainty that the problem is not that the reform process was undermined, but that the order of elections was distorted. Democracy was replaced by one-sided administration. Unbearable for a democracy that has signed with blood the North In this climate the results were carried out and counted. While in Western Europe and the Balkans the standard of freedoms and rights is a guarantee of the exercise of the vote, in Albania after May 26 it is becoming clear that representation itself has been taken hostage by the vote. This is why Western governments do not consider the Albanian crisis sufficiently closed. International reports have described May 26 as unacceptable and there is no great ambiguity on this point. If October 20 were to be considered a correction, it cannot erase the essence: the elections were held and won by power for power’s sake. Therefore Albania remains a problem for itself and for Europe. This is the political message that emerges from the statements of the U.S. Department of State and from other international positions on Albania.
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