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UNDER THE MASK 5

On Tuesday, 16 March, deputies from 26 Italian parties asked the government and parliament to separate from the Albanian government the international issue of Kosovo’s war of liberation. They demanded that Italian aid and all forms of support for Albania be suspended if the Albanian government, led by the Socialists and Prime Minister Pandeli Majko, did not change its stance toward the KLA. Their demand came at the beginning of the bombing of the bases of the Serbian army in Kosovo and immediately after the statement by the highest Albanian authorities that the armed liberation war of Kosovo should be regarded as part of the anti-fascist and anti-Nazi struggle of the Albanian people during World War II. This harsh reaction by 26 Italian deputies from their parties — Forza Italia, the National Alliance, the Northern League, the Republican Party, the Popular Party of the Segni Pact — with which they threatened the Albanian government and parliament that if they continued to support the KLA’s armed struggle, Italy would cut aid to Albania and oppose its admission to NATO and the European Union, above all expresses concern about the dimensions of anti-Kosovarism in Italian politics and culture. It seems that this anti-Kosovarism is part of one of the strong currents of anti-Albanian sentiment in general that has persisted since the 1990s. All the more so because this demand by the Italian deputies was made only 24 hours before Prime Minister D’Alema’s coalition government gave approval for the bombing of Serbian military bases in Kosovo. It was perhaps inevitable to ask: has Italian policy toward Albanians and the Kosovo war changed in these six years, or are we dealing with a continuation of an old approach? To what extent is this “fifth column” of anti-Kosovarism present in politics, culture, and journalism? The answer to this reaction requires looking at it in the context of Italo-Albanian relations and of part of the Italian establishment that for years has viewed the Albanian question with distrust and condescension. For part of public opinion and politics, Albanians were treated as an immigration problem, as a law-and-order problem, but not as a political subject with a right to freedom and self-determination. Therefore, support for the KLA and the liberation war was seen not as support for an oppressed people, but as a departure from the accepted diplomatic framework. This view was fed by old clichés, orientalist prejudices, imported fears, and a political culture that imagines the Balkans as its own unruly periphery. At the same time, official Italian positions were not homogeneous. There were voices of solidarity, aid, and support for the Albanians of Kosovo and for Albania. But the public appearance of the 26 deputies showed that another line remained active and organized. It did not attack the aggressor Serbia directly, but instead targeted the Albanians who were resisting. Thus, rather than condemning ethnic cleansing and repression, it tried to delegitimize resistance. This is why this tendency can be called a “fifth column” of anti-Kosovarism.

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