Balli Kombëtar
The Balli Kombëtar ("National Front") was an Albanian nationalist and anti-communist organization established in 1939. During World War II, it functioned largely as a resistance group against Italian and German occupation forces in Albania.[1] However, members of the Balli Kombëtar collaborated with the Axis Powers during their occupation of Greece and Yugoslavia. In 1943 for example, members recruited by the organization participated alongside the Wehrmacht in burning villages in Albania and Greece[2] and on the territory, which is today the modern Republic of Macedonia.[3]
The political program of the organization included the creation of "Great Albania", incorporating southern Montenegro, Kosovo, western Macedonia and Epirus in a single state. In 1943, the Albanian Communist Party declared war on Balli Kombëtar. The Communists won and proceeded to imprison, execute or force Balli Kombëtar members into exile, mainly to Europe and the United States.
References
- ^ Ficher, Brendt. Albania at War
- ^ Mazower, Mark. After The War Was Over: Reconstructing the Family, Nation and State in Greece, 1943-1960. Princeton University Press, 2000, ISBN 0691058423, p. 25. "Not surprisingly, when the Italians finally took control of mainland Greece in 1941, they found Cham activists willing to call for unification of the region with Albania. Several hundred were conscripted into the anti-communist Bal Komitare to act as local gendarmes. From the autumn of 1943, these armed bands took part alongside the Wehrmacht in burning Greek villages. Such actions, it seems, were not supported by many of the local beys, nor by the Mufti."
- ^ Балистичката организација во Македонија во Втората светска војна (1941 - 1944 година) [1]
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