Demonstrators and riot police fought pitched battles in the centre of Tirana on Saturday, marking the fifth day in a row of unrest in the Albanian capital. Masked protesters, many of them high school and university students, threw rocks and petrol bombs at officers guarding the education ministry, which was one of the main focal points of the demonstrations.
Police responded with water cannon and volleys of tear gas, which scattered the crowds. There were also reports that rubber bullets had been used for the first time during the protests. The movement began over the summer and has since widened into an anti-government campaign that calls on the prime minister to step down over corruption allegations linked to his administration.
Clashes shift to the prime minister’s office in Tirana
During the afternoon, the focus of the protests moved to the office of Prime Minister Edi Rama on the city’s main boulevard, where the crowds grew far larger than on previous days. Riot police faced a steady barrage of cobblestones and fireworks, and they answered with repeated rounds of tear gas. Some canisters landed far back in the crowds, causing panic.
Angered by the gas, protesters waited for the air to clear before renewing their attacks. Black smoke rose from a burning vehicle, and the sirens of police cars and ambulances cut through the afternoon. As dusk fell, police special forces were sent in to reinforce the riot police. Many of the protesters wore gas masks or face coverings, while volunteers handed out syringes of saline eyewash to ease the pain caused by the gas drifting down the street.
Officials and reports described injuries on both sides. So far, 80 people have been charged with disorder, and hundreds more have been arrested or are under investigation. The city centre, scattered with broken glass and burnt debris, looked increasingly like a war zone, according to observers on the scene.
Students explain their anger and their tactics
Among those on the streets was George, a 19-year-old medical student who works as an electrician to pay for his studies. Standing near the burnt-out education ministry building, with a scarf wrapped around his face and goggles over his eyes, he held two rocks intended for the police. Asked whether he worried about injuring officers, he said: “We have mothers too. We have family too.”
George said the protesters had been peaceful for 135 days and now wanted to bring about a change of government by more forceful means. “Our government doesn’t want peace, so we are using violence,” he said. He is one of thousands who have joined the protests, which intensified after they began in early June.
Many of the demonstrators were even younger. Klea, 17, is in her first year at university in Tirana, and she said that all the students were boycotting their classes and had left school to fight for their rights. She also alleged that provocateurs among the protesters were smashing up shops and banks in order to discredit the demonstrations. The students say they oppose what they call “the whole corrupt political class”, though it remains unclear what they would put in its place.
Rama’s response and the corruption investigations
Rama, a Socialist Party leader who has been in power for 13 years, has dominated Albanian politics in much the same way that his main rival, Sali Berisha of the opposition Democratic Party, did for decades. In a social media post on Saturday morning, Rama urged Albanians not to forget “that we have achieved extraordinary things.” He blamed the protests on the Democratic Party and on what he called “the sinister agenda of foreign actors, intent on halting our progress” towards EU membership, which he has promised by 2030. He did not say which foreign actors he meant.
Osman Stafa, a prominent journalist for the News24 channel who also describes himself as an activist for change, called for a “neutral, caretaker government for one year, to organise new elections.” The unrest is awkward for the European Union, which has long viewed Rama favourably and which Albania hopes to join. The protests have badly damaged the image Rama had carefully built as a charming leader guiding his country towards prosperity.
Separate investigations by a special prosecution service, set up under EU and US pressure in 2019, are also putting pressure on his government. Prosecutors recently arrested Vlora Hyseni, the head of the powerful secret service, who is accused of helping Ergys Agasi, a prominent businessman, former government official and personal friend of Rama, to evade justice. The 39-year-old is under arrest. Agasi, speaking through his lawyer, denied the allegations and said he had nothing to do with corruption. Hyseni told prosecutors that she had contacted Agasi in an attempt to recruit him to the intelligence services.
Several Albanian media outlets claim that Agasi acted as an intermediary between the prime minister and organised criminal groups. Rama has acknowledged that he knows Agasi but denies any knowledge of illegal transactions. Lutfi Dervishi, a political analyst and university lecturer, described the prime minister as caught between a rock and a hard place. “He’s the victim of his own success,” Dervishi said. “By concentrating so much power in his own hands, he has made himself the only person the people blame for their grievances.”
Rama’s Socialist Party holds a comfortable majority, with 83 of the 140 seats in the Albanian Parliament. The next parliamentary elections are not due until 2029.
