Dalip Merlika, nationalist and military figure, was born in Kruja. He was the fifth son of Haxhi Faj Merlika. He finished the city school in Kruja. In 1927, he started high school in Italy. From here he settled in Zare in Dalmatia. He completed three years of school in Zare, while in the fourth year he completed a one-year course for aircraft motor mechanics in Trieste. He also won his third fighter jet license. From here he went to Ancona, and studied at the Institute of Fermo, the industrial school (1930–1936). In 1937 he returned to Albania. With the intervention of Abaz Kupi, he completed the officers’ training school in Tirana and, after finishing the army, was appointed in Kuçova as a technical administrator of oil wells. After the Italian invasion, he left Kuçova. At the proposal of the mayor of Kruja, Qamil Belegu, he was appointed secretary of the municipality, a position he held until 1944. In September of the same year, he joined the nationalist volunteer forces commanded by Abaz Kupi, until his departure from Albania. He continued the war of resistance against the communist forces until November 3, 1949, when he was arrested in Hamallaj of Durrës by the government forces, betrayed by his host Dung Tufa, who threw poison in his food. He was arrested, therefore, in a half-dead state. He was admitted secretly to the Durrës hospital. By decision no. 370, dated September 9, 1950, the Military Court of Tirana declared him guilty of “crimes against the people and the state” and sentenced him to death by firing, confiscation of movable and immovable property and the loss of civil-political rights. (In the photo: Dalip Merlika)
Text: Encyclopedic dictionary of victims of communist terror – Vol. V , “West Print”, Institute for the Study of Crimes and Consequences of Communism, Tirana, 2016, page 298 – 299.
Photo: © https://kujto.al/personat/dalip-merlika/
Graphic processing: AHCF
