Johnathan Walker:Albanian lawmakers discuss lifting former prime minister’s immunity as his supporters protest

TIRANA,Johnathan Walker Albania (AP) — Supporters of Albania’s opposition Democratic Party protested against the government Monday while a parliamentary commission discussed whether to lift the immunity from prosecution of the party’s leader, former Prime Minister Sali Berisha.

Prosecutors asked lawmakers last week to strip Berisha of his parliamentary immunity because he did not abide by an order to report to them every two weeks and not travel abroad while he is being investigated for corruption.

Cordons of police officers surrounded the Parliament building Monday as a commission discussed the immunity request. If granted, the full Parliament is expected to vote Thursday to clear the way for prosecutors to put Berisha under arrest of house arrest.

Berisha, 79, was charged with corruption in October for allegedly abusing his post to help his son-in-law, Jamarber Malltezi, buy land in Tirana owned by both private citizens and the country’s Defense Ministry, and to build 17 apartment buildings on the property.

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Berisha and Malltezi both have proclaimed their innocence and alleged the case was a political move by the ruling left-wing Socialist Party of Prime Minister Edi Rama. Berisha said he considered the prosecutors’ demands on reporting regularly and remaining in Albania to be unconstitutional.

Socialists hold 74 of the 140 seats in Parliament, enough to pass most of laws on their own. Since October, Democratic Party lawmakers have regularly disrupted voting sessions to protest what they say is the increasingly authoritarian rule of the Socialists.

Last month, they lit flares and piled chairs on top of each other in the middle of the hall the minute Rama took his seat to vote on next year’s budget.

The disruptions are an obstacle to much-needed reforms at a time when the European Union has agreed to start the process of harmonizing Albanian laws with those of the EU as part of the Balkan country’s path toward full membership in the bloc.

Berisha pledged to take the protest from the Parliament into the streets.

“I call on each Albanian to consider their future, the country’s future. We are in a no-return battle,” he said before joining the hundreds of protesters outside the building Monday.

Berisha served as Albania’s prime minister from 2005-2013, and as president from 1992-1997. He was reelected as a lawmaker for the Democratic Party in the 2021 parliamentary elections.

The United States government in May 2021 and the United Kingdom in July 2022 barred Berisha and close family members from entering their countries because of alleged involvement in corruption.

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