Public encouragement project for discussing Albanian communist history

The OSCE presence in Albania, funded by the German government, has started a project for encouraging a wide public discussion about the communist past of Albania. 

The activities will start with a poll that will measure the public’s knowledge, the perception and expectancies for the discussions about the communist past of Albania.

The results of this poll will offer a more clear panorama of the general knowledge, that will orientate the hopes and concerns in treating the heritage of the past regime.

The results will also offer a stable bases for future initiatives in this area.

The OSCE presence, in cooperation with various civil society organizations, will organize meetings in high schools and the community.

Students and other citizens will discuss the way to treat the past after seeing movies and documentaries based on the human rights violations during the communist regime. 

A big TV debate is expected to be organized by the end of the year.

“During the past months there has been a new rush for initiatives regarding the human right violation during the former communist regime in Albania. We are starting this project because we believe there is the need for a national dialogue regarding the expectancies of the society and about the different initiatives proposed to treat this difficult part of the history”, declared the head of the OSCE presence in Albania, Florian Raunig.

The German ambassador to Albania, Helmut Hoffman, declared that he was happy fro the support offered to the OSCE presence in Albania for this important initiative.

“We know from our experience that facing a difficult past is not an easy task. We also know that if done in a positive way, this could serve to the people and the society in general. However, every case is specific. We are happy to give our support, but it is up to the Albanians to decide how they want to treat this task”, Hoffman declared.