ALBANIA

Country Summary

While Albania’s entrance to the Council of Europe in June 1995 promised improved press freedom in the country, last May’s parliamentary elections sparked a renewed crackdown on the opposition press, as the ruling party tried to limit critical coverage of the government. During the months leading to the elections, officials in President Sali Berisha’s ruling Democratic Party impounded delivery trucks servicing Koha Jone, a leading opposition newspaper, and made sweeping arrests of Koha Jone’s staff for tenuous connections with a bombing in Tirana. After the bombing, authorities arrested and detained another journalist, who had written for the daily Populli Po, on the suspicion that an article she had written in November 1995 was related to the incident.

Radio and television news remains entirely state controlled, providing only one-sided, pro-government coverage. On election day, May 26, the Albanian government cut regular programming by a German news agency and continued to bar the broadcast for one week. Following the elections, which opposition parties and Western observers said had been manipulated, authorities again targeted print journalists, this time harassing and attacking them while they covered opposition rallies protesting the elections. Meanwhile, the Albanian government continued heavy monitoring of all radio and television broadcasts, often censoring programs from Western news agencies.

Most nongovernmental newspapers were directly affiliated with opposition parties. Several editors and writers from opposition newspapers ran for office in the May elections and in the Oct. 20 runoffs, in which the ruling Democratic Party claimed a landslide victory.

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