Petrit Latif
“The Extermination of the Albanians”
In 1913, the “Tiroler Stimmen” published an article titled “Die Ausrottung der Albaner” meaning “the extermination of the Albanians”. The article discusses the reports of the the Serbian atrocities in Albanian territory, which the Frankfurter Zeitung published. The Vienna Foreign Office also had reliable reports of “shameful atrocities” which the Serbs committed.
Shameful atrocities
“Recently, the Frankfurter Zeitung published an article with the above excerpt. A few days later, the same paper reported from Vienna that the article had caused a great stir there. The Vienna Foreign Office also had reliable reports of shameful atrocities, but held back from publishing them so as not to increase the excitement in Europe and because they were sure that the Serbian authorities would deny them. This also happened promptly, without making much of an impression on the paper.”
Serbian authorities quickly denied these reports
“The article in the aforementioned newspaper referred to the terrible report that had reached the Shkup that 300 Albanians had again been shot by Serbs without a court order, and continued: This report will, of course, be denied immediately, since all the atrocities and crimes proven in the conduct of the war by the Albanian state have so far been simply denied.”
Most of the war crimes were committed by the regular Serbian army
“No impartial observer in Europe attaches any value to these denials. As far as the conduct of the war in Albania is concerned, the excuse that such events are merely the work of irresponsible gangs, Komitadjis, over whom the Serbian army command has no power, cannot hold. In the current case, regular Serbian military appears to have perpetrated the massacres.”
The atrocities were tolerated and according to the will of the Serbian authorities
“But even where the most difficult routes were otherwise left to the irregular auxiliary troops, they acted without a doubt with the full tolerance and according to the will of the Serbian authorities.”
Serbian government: We will exterminate the Albanians
“At the beginning of the war, a clear statement was made to us by responsible Serbian authorities: “We will exterminate the Albanians.” After all the European protests against this systematic policy of extermination continue unabated, it seems to us imperative to publish the views of the gentlemen in Belgrade.”
Denial
“These gentlemen will deny it with great certainty, certain that journalistic incompetence prevents us from naming any names. But it goes without saying that we would not support such a division if we did not absolutely adhere to it”.
Albanians were a majority on the country side and Serbs were few in the cities and in Western Serbia
“In most of the conquered territory, Serbs are found almost exclusively in the cities, and even there, as in western Serbia, there is often an insignificant number. In the countryside, mostly Albanians live. The same people the entire Ottoman Empire had been unable to cope with. It was clear that the Belgrade government would not be able to cope with them either.”
Serbia needed new land
“What Serbia needed were not new subjects, but rather new land, and what could it do better than a land without a home? Thus, from the outset, it was determined to make the Albanians ownerless, as far as they could be saved, and for these two motives, the slogan was quietly proclaimed: Extermination of the Albanians!”
What does Europe say about this demise of an already subjugated people? Are governments once again content to submit their consular reports to the friendly attention of the Serbian government? to send them in? One must be convinced that the gentlemen in Belgrade know what is happening in Albania. But they also know that they are currently at a great distance from the goodwill of Europe, with regard to the demarcation of Albania and a number of other issues. It is time, they say, that the Great Powers can treat a country that still allows itself to be rule.”
Reference
Balkan Academia 