Protesters in Albania have fought with riot police on the seventh consecutive day of violent clashes.
The protesters, many of them high school and university students, are trying to oust embattled Prime Minister Edi Rama. Official figures said 295 people have been injured, 186 of whom are police officers, before Monday’s violence.
“The moment the state negotiates with this,” Rama told grim-faced police chiefs, brandishing a rock hurled at police on Sunday, “the state has fallen”.
A police station and government buildings in Tirana have been attacked during the protests, which are being driven by demands for better university conditions, anger over corruption and calls for Rama’s resignation.
The protesters included “young men and women who have been radicalised by dark forces in Europe and the US”, Rama said. “Albania has become one of the targets of a well co-ordinated attack.”
In brilliant October sunshine in Rinia Park, also known as Youth Park, I watched people prising loose cobble stones – like that brandished by the prime minister – as ammunition for later battles with police. They did not have long to wait.
A convoy of police vehicles advanced down a broad boulevard, led by an armoured truck firing water cannon and tear gas canisters among the fleeing protesters.
Squads of riot police chased the predominantly student crowd through the park. Protesters took refuge in a cafe where even the eyes of the waiters streamed from the teargas.
Under trees, volunteers in yellow reflector jackets stood their ground helping those overcome by the fumes. I watched a young man remonstrating with a policeman, who then fired pepper spray in his face at point-blank range.
“The police actions are often chaotic and stupid,” human rights lawyer Gentian Sejrani told the BBC. He provides legal support to more than 100 people who have been arrested.
“In court, the police rarely present evidence,” he said. His clients include a man arrested on his way to a bus stop – completely unrelated to the protests, he said.
“Those who are actually throwing stuff at the police rarely get caught, because they run the fastest,” Serjani said.
Police appear as incensed by the violence against their colleagues as the protesters are by the strong-arm tactics of the police. The result is mayhem.
Outside the cafe in the park, when the gas has cleared, 27-year-old activist Sidorela Vatnikaj, a masters student, describes her typical day. In a movement without leaders she is one of the more experienced, with eight years in the forefront of anti-government protests behind her.
“In the morning, you try to co-ordinate with all the groups – where they are, and where the protest is taking place. If any lawyers are needed, if any first aid kit or any kind of equipment is needed. And you also have to make sure all your friends, your family members in the protest are OK.”
The day is spent going from protest to protest, much of it running from police, she said.
She is uncomfortable with the violence towards the authorities from her fellow protesters, but blames the police for starting and fuelling it.
“When I see people throwing stones at the police, I understand their anger. I don’t judge them. I’m not happy, but they have no other way to be listened to,” Vatnikaj said.
“They come from families whose family members had no other choice than to leave the country – a million in the past decade. They have not only been robbed, they have been bullied, ignored and now they they have also been beaten up.”
At the weekend, the prime minister asked rhetorically what would happen if he stepped down.
“We need a technocratic government for one year, to prepare the country for real, democratic elections,” Vatnikaj replies. She has accused Rama of rigging previous elections, and of being hand in glove with rich foreign investors and organised crime groups.
Young people in Albania feel encouraged by their fellow Gen Z protesters around the world, Vatnikaj said.
“I have seen my mother and father’s generation, working all their lives and dreaming of having a democratic society where they could live with dignity. That never happened,” she said.
Rama has been in power for 13 years, and has been a dominant figure in Albanian politics since the turn of the century. He has promised EU membership by 2030, and said he is the only one who can deliver it.
