AFP/Tirana
A youth looks out yesterday from inside a burnt-out police car next to the Albanian government building in Tirana, a day after a deadly riot in which three people were killed during an anti-government demonstration. Albanian opposition leader Edi Rama vowed to push on with protests despite the government’s accusations that they are staging a coup
Albanian Prime Minister Sali Berisha has slammed the opposition for a “Tunisia-style” revolt and called for counter demonstrations as opposition leaders vowed to continue their protest.
Berisha accused the socialist opposition of wanting “a Tunisian-style scenario for
Tens of thousands of people took to the streets for an anti-government protest called by the opposition on Friday.
The demonstration ended with violent clashes between protesters and the police and three people were killed.
Longtime Tunisian leader Zine El Abidine Ben Ali was ousted in mid-January amid street protests and fled to
The clashes in
“I call on Albanians to gather Wednesday in Tirana to protest against the violence, it will be a big demonstration against violence”, Berisha told a press conference.
His call came shortly after opposition leader Edi Rama vowed that the anti-government protests would continue.
“After the mourning period we will start the protest again,” Rama, who is also the mayor of Tirana, told AFP yesterday.
It is unclear when the anti-government protests will start again as two of the victims remain in the morgue and it is not known when they will be buried.
A third victim was buried yesterday with the opposition leaders attending the ceremony.
It also remained unclear who had shot the demonstrators, but Berisha earlier said they had been killed by weapons that police and the army “do not use” and blamed the protest’s organisers for the violence.
The opposition said the victims were shot by soldiers as they tried to enter government buildings.
The Albanian prosecutor’s office announced yesterday that it has issued at least six arrest warrants for people suspected of playing a role in the deaths but would give no further details.
“Six arrest warrants were issued on Saturday afternoon by the prosecution but as long as they have not been carried out by the police we cannot confirm the names nor the functions of the people,” prosecution spokesman Plator Nesturi said.
According to prosecution sources the warrants were issued for “six soldiers of the republican guard who will be investigated for the shooting death of at least three people”.
A hospital spokesman said a fourth shooting victim is still in critical condition.
“The death of the three people is nothing other than a crime carried out by the state. Prime Minister Sali Berisha and his institutions are solely responsible,” Rama said.
Police spokeswoman Alma Katragjini told AFP that 113 people were arrested on Friday for throwing stones and Molotov cocktails at police.
US Ambassador to Albania Alexander Arvizu, who was to meet President Bamir Topi with the other accredited ambassadors to
“I am very concerned about the prospect for calling for any additional demonstrations. Now is not the time for more demonstrations in the streets,” he said in a statement.
He added that in his view Friday’s anti-government protest was not peaceful, as he had urged earlier.
“There were many thousands of people in the streets and the vast majority of them, from what I could see, arrived with peaceful means and intentions. But there was a small handful of people who arrived with a different agenda,” he stressed.
Since the collapse of the hardline communist regime in 1991, elections in the country have often been marred by violence and allegations of fraud. The current impasse is the longest political crisis the country has faced.