The “Second League of Prizren” (1943-1944), a political and military organization, which was created in Kosovo to fight for the preservation of the integrity of the Albanian ethnic lands from the risk of fragmentation and against the entry into Kosovo of chetnik formations of Serbian, Montenegrin, and Macedonian partisan parties. Unlike the national liberation movement and some nationalist groups that were engaged in the war against the Nazi-fascist invaders, the main nationalist forces were reluctant to do the same, to join them, as they felt that a war led by the communists would end with the restoration of Yugoslav power in the province. The most vocal representatives of nationalist circles considered the Italian and then the German occupier as the lesser evil compared to Serbian and Yugoslav rule, which was expected to be restored after their withdrawal. Precisely for this reason, after the capitulation of Italy, they elaborated the idea of calling a national assembly, which had to lay the foundations for the creation of a political organization, which would protect the ethnic territories from the risk of the reoccupation of Kosovo by Yugoslav forces, after the departure of German troops. The Assembly met in Prizren. It was attended by 45 delegates chosen from Kosovo and other Albanian territories. The Assembly decided to form the Second League of Prizren, a national political organization which would be committed to the unification and protection of ethnic lands. The Assembly elected the Central Committee of the League, consisting of 7 people. Rexhep Mitrovica, a well-known activist of the national issue, was elected chairman of the League. In the Second Assembly, which was held on January 17–21, 1944, changes were made to the head of the League. Bedri Pejani was elected chairman of the Central Committee, after Rexhep Mitrovica was appointed prime minister of the government that the Germans set up in Tirana. The Assembly also approved the League’s statute, which was decreed by the Supreme Council on March 14, 1944. The League would also have its own organ “The League of Prizren“, on whose pages the idea of creating ethnic Albania was propagated and the crimes committed by Serbs against Kosovo Albanians were condemned. (In the photo: Participants in the second League of Prizren, 1943.)
Text: The history of the Albanian people – Vol. IV, Academy of Sciences of Albania, “Toena“, Tirana, 2009, page 138-139.
Graphic processing: AHCF
