Rama salutes group displaying Greater Albania map

Have these underemployed individuals got nothing better to do than wave flags around. Quite a sad and sorry site.

Rama is a snake. He only lies when he opens his mouth. With backward politicians like Rama Albania will remain the armpit of Europe.

(ETHNIC ALBANIA, 12 November 2014 11:28)

I don't think most people care what you call your sick project of territorial expansion. "ethnic Albania", "greater Albania", it makes no difference. The goal remains the same, unite Albania with the hundreds of thousands of Albanians that got the hell out of Albania to find a better life.

But in order to achieve this, you will have to go to war with 4 real countries. I don't know how you plan on winning, but I urge you to try. You guys really are proud, though I am not too certain for what achievements exactly. But you should channel this pride into achieving your expansions ASAP.

And if you can defeat all 4 of your neighbors for their land, you deserve it. My humble prediction is that because you wont have the strongest military alliance on the planet acting as your air force, you will fail and fail miserably. But let's see what really happens.

@ ETHNIC ALBANIAN, enough with your BS pipe dreams. Albanians have no history or culture. Your so called people have achieved nothing except for crime, terror and poverty and it continues to this day. So please spare us from you're drug induced fairy tales. Albanians belong in the slums of Turkey and the middle east from where they came from

A Great Serbia, Great Greece means wiping out foreign territories from their autochthonous inhabitants and occupying them.
(ETHNIC ALBANIA

There's nothing more laughable than Albanians talking about history which they hardly know. So Greece and Serbia committed massacres against Albanian populations. Can you name the years and places that those "massacres" took place backed by a historical authority on the subject?As to your claim that Albanians being "autochthonous"in the Balkans the history of Greece didn't start with the Ottomans but 4000 years before that. What Albanians claim as "Albanian" land is really nothing other than former Ottoman possessions.Maybe a read on the Muslims settling in the Balkans during the rule of the Ottomans Murad IV and Suleiman II could help you to learn more about your race( a reading list of Turkish historians is readily available).The truth is the ancestors of modern-day Albanians were nothing more than petty thieves and cut-throats employed by the Ottomans as enforcers on the occupied lands which the often cleansed of their original Christian inhabitants.
Albanians should be more than happy with what they've managed to steal from their neighbours but if they continue with their wild nationalist dreams they will definitely lose their lot.

There is something you Serbs and all the world need to understand: This is not the map of GREAT Albania, This is the map of ETHNIC Albania.
A Great Serbia, Great Greece means wiping out foreign territories from their autochthonous inhabitants and occupying them.
While ETHNIC Albania means uniting territories inhabited since thousands of years by Albanians! But divided so badly in 1913 between 5 countries by Great European powers at that time! This is the main reason why Albanians hates Europe which was very unfair towards us throughout our history and to understand the hate between Serbs and Albanians you have to go deeper in history. We are a small nation in Europe but proud people.Cheers 

Rama got you all Serbs shook up. He told you in your PMs face to recognize Kosova, and what did you do? Complain about it as usual. A natural Albanian map is not Ramas fault. That's just the way we've been divided, and what has been done unfair will be undone to make it right. We all witnessed the greater serbia project, by wiping out all non serbians. We don't have to do ghat, we will have meaningless borders between countries where Albanians live. Same goes for serbians in north, they have that opportunity why shouldn't we? We have to make it fair for all serbians are not any special.

Who on the Earth would even attempt to stop the push for a Greater Albania.
(Bam Bam, 12 November 2014 12:14)

The same states that stopped every other Greater project in the 1990s and the 1940s. Your question also suggests Albania has the capacity to launch such a campaign when they can barely take care of their own in Albania, let alone assist in irredentism abroad. But no surprise you fall for the rhetoric seeing as how you also jerk off to NDH fantasies when you need to be Croatian.

Nikolle

Contemporary historiography clarifies that "there is no conclusive evidence that "Albanians" constituted the majority of the population in Kosovo or Albania prior to the Ottoman occupation". Even the "pro-Albanian" history written by Noel Malcolm concedes that "the region probably had a predominantly Orthodox Christian and Slavic population from the eight to the mid-nineteenth centuries". A majority of the names given in the charters are overwhelmingly Slavic rather than Albanian. This has been interpreted as evidence of an overwhelming Serbian majority. This claim is also supported by the Ottoman tax census (defter) of 1455 which considered both religion and language and found that the majority of the population were Slavic.In fact the Albanian narrative that Kosovo was always Albanian is contradicted mostly by Turkish historians. Talip Kucukean in Recclaiming identity and Akkayan (1979) Migration In, From, and to Southeastern Europe: Historical and cultural aspects both state when the Turks conquered Kosovo it was mainly inhabited by few thousand Roman Christians (there were no ethnicities at the time) and subsequently the Ottomans transported thousands of Turkish nomads into Balkans in order to change the demographics and Implement the Milliyet system.To answer your question I will quote the Albanians favourite historian Malcolm who said " It's a mystery when and where the Albanians came from".Does it sound Illyrian?

So it is OK for the Serbian President to seat in the same stadium were the 30 000 Serbian fans shouting Death to Albanians and it's not OK when somehow one person displays the Ethnic Albania Map and Rama is the bad guy here ..... Really?
I also find it ironic for Vucic to complaining to same ambassadors France. USA who bombed and recognized Kosovo and they actually say same thing Rama said on press conference.
Ari Gold think about it before you trash someone who you really don't know him at all.
And FYI His brother really was harassed in Belgrade and a cussed wrongly by top gov officials.
You guys are doing just same this time with Edi Rama
respect

I'm confused as to who to believe now. The list of places Albanians come from, as put forward by commentators on B92:

Turkey
Sicily
Azerbaijan
Arabian Peninsula
Middle East

Make up your minds, we never change ours

Greetings from the United States of Albania- USA.

Non- Slavic

All Natural

Indigenous

Shiperia

The only threat to Serbia, and to the world for that matter, is America and its poodles in the NATO Pact. Albania has no capacity to hurt its neighbours and it is not Albania that now occupies Kosovo, it's the "Murcans."

US power and wealth appears to be disappearing as quickly as British power did after WW2. Once the US Dollar becomes merely a local currency and not an international currency, then US interventions abroad will virtually cease. US Navy ships will rust in their home docks and 1000 foreign military bases will be abandoned. I don't know if this will take 5 years or 20 years to complete, but my guess is that the US Empire will end quickly.

With US Empire gone I suspect the Albanian PM will show more respect to his neighbours.

@ Leeonidas,

Since I am young and not found of history,

Dose Masacre of Racak(Kosovo) 15 January 1999 ring any bell. Check wikipedia and maybe you will understand why "NATO" bombarded you moron.

It’s going to be a big shock to these Albos that a greater Albania will never take place. These simple people think that they have the population and Brussels must support that population with social security by closing schools and hospitals in the EU and redirecting that money to them.
Lads, that ship has truly sailed. No more money.

It's kind of good he saw that this so-called "obsolete myth" is still taken seriously in outside his beloved kingdom among his less enlightened and tolerant subjects. Can't say he really appreciated it, though I'm sure he got a warm fuzzy feeling nonetheless.

But more importantly, who cares? Other than the handful of internet yokels who actually think this is around the corner, "Autochthonous Albania" is "Fictitious Albania" and the first and only Greater Whatever project to be thrown in the dustbin of history before it even started. I'm so done with Rama's wasted and unproductive trip to Serbia which may have pleased a handful of eurocrats in Brussels, but did nothing to mend fences between Serbia and Albania. If anything, Rama showed he's a horrible guest who frequently goes off script to score points and Vucic showed he's an immature host who can't even keep it together for a relative nobody on the diplomatic front. Thank goodness this charade is over. See you in another 68 years. Don't let the door hit you on the rear on your way back to Tirana.

@leonidas
you seem to be pretty well versed in history.
Could you please show us some links or evidence supporting your theory, or are you just regurgitating the old serb national propaganda vomit.
thanks

no need for war, 2 albanian states in the balkans so far, macedonia will be the third albanian states...do you know what that means, once this region enter EU, and the EU parliament, Albanians will have 3 votes, and thats how you become powerful :) good bye
(eric, 13 November 2014 04:43)
You poor deluded fool. If you think that you’ll get anything out of Brussels you are living in ga ga land. The system will be rigged where you’re lucky to have one vote. Do you think that Brussels has dropped out of the tree yesterday to allow this to happen? LOL Brussels does not need more social security beneficiaries nor do they want Muslims to have any power or say in Europe.
You guys have been going backwards for so long that the west has no convinced you that you’re actually forward.

Don't the Serbs realise that the Albanian people are increasingly getting stronger. Who on the Earth would even attempt to stop the push for a Greater Albania. It's only a matter of time.

Rama is a snake. He only lies when he opens his mouth. With backward politicians like Rama Albania will remain the armpit of Europe.
(So sad, too bad, 12 November 2014 10:27)

You got it all wrong man. He says things as they are. You may not like him, or what he has ta say but he will speak his mind anywhere and everywhere. As a matter of fact I don't like him. However you have to give credit where credit is due. He doesn't just talk to the talk but also walk the walk. He has the signs to prove it. He is one of the main founders of the democratic movement against Hoxha's regime. He had his skull cracked open because he spoke against any and every sign of dictatorship, and he still has the bullets from snipers trying to kill him through the windows of his own home; again, because he's always spoken against the corrupt and powerful. Right now he's the only politician in the Balkans who will not mince words and try to fool you. He despises nationalism and any sign of autocracy. He's been like that since his early days as an artist. He's highly intelligent and he believes in the United Europe with all his being. He's the antithesis of what you have in Belgrade. He will be the first one to invite Vucic to yell at the top of his lungs whatever he wants in Tirana, because he believes free spech is free everywhere and enytime: Belgrade, Tirana etc. He puts his lif on the line for his beliefs. He should move faster with his changes. He's too slow right now.

(Leonidas@
If you really think that Slavs are the native people in Balkan peninsula older than Illyrians and Hellenes than you must recognize FYROM as Republic of Macedonia and give them the northern eastern part of Greece. RIGHT?

@leonidas
"The modern Greeks, as we know, have no relationship to the Latins, nor for that matter with the ancient Greeks. Modern anthropology has shown that they are brachycephalous Slavs, while the ancient Greeks were dolichocephalous, which fact is sufficient to establish an absolutely fundamental separation between the modern Greeks and their pretended ancestors."
("The Psychology of Socialism" by Gustave Le Bon, page 206)

@leonidas
The atrocities committed against the Cham Albanians by the Greek state during W.W.I are called the Albanian Genocide. Genocide is the organized killing of a people for the express purpose of putting an end to their collective existence. Because of its scope, genocide requires central planning and a machinery to implement it. This makes genocide the quintessential state crime as only a government has the resources to carry out such a scheme of destruction. The Albanian Genocide was centrally planned and administered by the Greek government against the entire Albanian population in South Epirus. It was carried out during W.W.I The Cham Albanian people were subjected to deportation, expropriation, abduction, torture, massacre, and starvation. The great bulk of the Cham population was forcibly removed from South Epirus to Albania and Turkey, where the vast majority was sent into hell to die of thirst and hunger. Large numbers of Cham Albanians were methodically massacred by Greeks. Women and children were abducted and horribly abused. The entire wealth of the Cham Albanian was expropriated. After only a little more than a year of calm at the end of W.W.I, the atrocities were renewed between 1920 and 1923, and the remaining of Cham Albanians were subjected to further massacres and expulsions.

If you really think that Slavs are the native people in Balkan peninsula older than Illyrians and Hellenes than you must recognize FYROM as Republic of Macedonia and give them the northern eastern part of Greece. RIGHT?
(ETHNIC ALBANIA

I haven't said the Slavs are older than Illyrians .What I have said is Albanians are not Illyrians.

Thats not true be92, either way what was he supposed to say to them to go f*** themselves ?

very interesting. place names tell us nothing about demographics, they only assert who the ruling people were, that's all. there is a reason why Constantinople is now called Istanbul. either way, I have read Noel Malcolm's book and he does in it, that it is most likely Albanians come from Illyrians. not that it matters to me, nor does it shape my opinions on politics, because even if Albanians came from South Africa, my opinion on Kosovo would stay the same. however, the Albanian language is a classified Indo-European one, it means its not Turkic, nor is it Middle Eastern, nor is it Arabic. so we can now rule that continent out. if you have an issue with this classification, do the following, enrol in the Institute of Albanology, publish your scholarly work that demonstrates a clear connection between the Albanian language and that of Turkish and show where people are wrong. not on person is stopping, because if you were right, it would mean, that Albania itself was never populated by Albanians until relatively recently. That however, I have never read anyone claim ever.

Could you please show us some links or evidence supporting your theory, or are you just regurgitating the old serb national propaganda vomit.
thanks
(whocares, 12 November 2014 16:58)

Everything you ever wanted to know about Albanian history (as of 2014. Warning, content subject to change with shifting agendas and goals)

http://uncyclopedia.wikia.com/wiki/Albania

The term ethnic cleansing was apparently used by the Albanians in Kosovo.

Not so innocent.

Edi Rama talks about Greater Albania being a myth, that nobody wants it, but he refuses to condemn the idea. Instead, he drops his subtle hints about it. For example, stopping to salute these people with the Greater Albania flag. Besides stoking that notion, it also reveals his true feelings. Then in Presevo on Tuesday, a city in Serbia, he makes this statement......He also told those present that the Albanian people "are not dreaming about creating a Greater Albania but a Greater Europe that will include all Albanian territories." ........ So, he comes out to speak against Greater Albania yet speaks of 'Albanian territories'. It's quite obvious that he considers Presevo an Albanian territory. That was a question he should have been asked but wasn't. Anyhow, his statement shows it. So if he thinks that, along with parts of Montenegro, Macedonia, and Greece are Albanian territories, then he is for a Greater Albania. Period.

He is playing politician and playing words exceptionally well. He knew he would get the reaction he did from Serbia with his Kosovo rhetoric. Then he quickly says Greater Albania is not in his interest, while talking about 'Albanian territory' in Serbia. It's obvious what he is doing, and what the agenda is. A real politician would have told the crowd in Presevo he is not their prime minister and to work hard for a better life in Serbia for all Albanians. Instead, he used the term 'Albanian territories'.

(ETHNIC ALBANIA, 12 November 2014 11:28)

I don't think most people care what you call your sick project of territorial expansion. "ethnic Albania", "greater Albania", it makes no difference. The goal remains the same, unite Albania with the hundreds of thousands of Albanians that got the hell out of Albania to find a better life.

But in order to achieve this, you will have to go to war with 4 real countries. I don't know how you plan on winning, but I urge you to try. You guys really are proud, though I am not too certain for what achievements exactly. But you should channel this pride into achieving your expansions ASAP.

And if you can defeat all 4 of your neighbors for their land, you deserve it. My humble prediction is that because you wont have the strongest military alliance on the planet acting as your air force, you will fail and fail miserably. But let's see what really happens.
(Ari Gold, 12 November 2014 12:06)

no need for war, 2 albanian states in the balkans so far, macedonia will be the third albanian states...do you know what that means, once this region enter EU, and the EU parliament, Albanians will have 3 votes, and thats how you become powerful :) good bye

ETHNIC ALBANIA,

What a speech.How could the Greek state do such a thing to such a lovely bunch of people like the chams? The Ottoman enforcers,killers and enslavers of thousands of Greeks.Do you know of the crimes the Egyptian /Albanian Ibrahim Pasha and the Chams committed during the Greek war of independence? Thousands of women ,children killed and sold in Peloponnese on the slave bazaars of Turkey and Egypt.The Chams were lucky to escape with their lives back to Turkey.The ones left in Greece never forgot their trade and during World War II alligned themselves with Fascist Italy and Germany and helped the Germans sent all the Jews from Epirus to concentration camps.This is what British Colonel Chris Woodhouse, head of the Allied Military Mission in Greece said about the Chams:
"Chams are racially part Turk, part Albanian.In 1941-3 they collaborated with Italians, making the organization of guerilla resistance in that area difficult. Zervas encouraged by the Allied Mission, chased them out of their homes in 1944 in order to facilitate operations against the enemy. They mostly took refuge in Albania, where they were not popular either. Their eviction from Greece was bloodily carried out, which was fed by many brutalities committed by the Chams in league with the Italians.The Chams deserved what they got. The result has been in effect a shift of populations, removing an unwanted minority from Greek soil. Perhaps it would be best to leave things at that”.

Nikolle,

The fact that Constantinople was renamed Istanbul is because of conquest and not because the Turks had ancient roots in those lands.Demographics don't establish ancestry.Malcolm is going around the bush and doesn't make a claim of Illyrian and Albanian connections.In fact he diverts all the research of the subject into linguistics which have established the fact that Albanian and Illyrian have little or nothing in common, judging from the handful of Illyrian words that archaeologists have retrieved. In fact the two inscriptions found to date one reads in Greek when turned upside down and the other is blank.It's worth mentioning what the views of the Austrian linguists on the matter.As Matzinger-the Austrian linguist said-“You’ll find the doctrine about the Illyrian origin of Albanians everywhere,from popular to scientific literature and schoolbooks. “There is no discussion about this, it’s a fact. They say, ‘We are Illyrians’ and that’s that,”.Their far fetched claims of Illyrian descent and being indigenous to the region have become masks for greater Albania.It can be said that modern Albania is as much of an artificial creation as Fyrom without a history of state building or of establishing unique historical traditions. It emerged as an Austro-Hungarian project in 1913 of blocking Serbian expansion in the south and ever since Albanians have always been dependent on outside help to survive.

@leonidas
The Albanian race was settled in the Balkan Peninsula before the Hellenes arrived and centuries upon centuries before the Serbs were heard of in the civilized world. Pyrrhus, Alexander the Great, Scanderbeg were of that race. The Independent, Volume 107 Leonard Bacon, Joseph Parrish Thompson, Richard Salter Storrs Education - 1921 (Page 9)
There is not such a thing as ''greek tribes'',because the greeks existed since 19th century,as a national group!According to the latest DNA tests,modern Greeks have 32% of East African blood in them,31% middle eastern,15%central Asian and only 11% Balkanic. Meaning,Greeks are FOREIGN to the land they inhabit.They're a mixture of Jews,Turks,Slavs,Albanians,Vlachs etc.The difference between them and the ancient Greeks is like from Athens to Tokyo.People lie,DNA doesn't.

"That Illyrian argument is used by 99.99% of the Albanians here without having any understanding of it at all. "

OK, I can only tell you what I think. I don't have time for people who use this we-were-here-first argument because its flippant. To me, its immaterial who came here first. We have to deal with what is now, not what was here 2000 years ago. Now your view is that Albanians grew in size and became a majority, however, that Kosovo has had a sizeable Albanian population for at least the last 300 years, is pretty well attested. Maybe not as much of a clear majority as now, but a sizeable presence none the less. Thing is though, even if your theory was true, it still wouldn't make Serbia's argument valid. Ultimately I wouldn't even support Kosovo independence had Serbia shown clarity in the 1990's and not engaged in brutality over its citizens of Albanian ethnicity. Frankly there is no other choice, because when over 90% of those who dwell here don't want to be a part of Serbia, it becomes a problem. If you think logically, its not even in Serbia's interest to keep it and I'll tell you why, because although the Albanian birthrate is now in decline, its still growing faster than that of Serbs, so if current trends should continue, within 60 years Albanians will become a majority in the whole of Serbia. This is just one argument, I have many others

"The modern Greeks, as we know, have no relationship to the Latins, nor for that matter with the ancient Greeks. Modern anthropology has shown that they are brachycephalous Slavs, while the ancient Greeks were dolichocephalous, which fact is sufficient to establish an absolutely fundamental separation between the modern Greeks and their pretended ancestors."
("The Psychology of Socialism" by Gustave Le Bon, page 206)
(ETHNIC ALBANIA, 13 November 2014 11:51)

No serious historian would ever claim that modern peoples are direct descendants of ancient peoples, at least in terms of DNA. What really matters is continuation (e.g. culture, language, occasionally religion) which ensures the historical sense of an evolving community through time.In other words, modern Greeks have many features enabling them to look back to antiquity.

no need for war, 2 albanian states in the balkans so far, macedonia will be the third albanian states...do you know what that means, once this region enter EU, and the EU parliament, Albanians will have 3 votes, and thats how you become powerful :) good bye
(eric, 13 November 2014 04:43)

Clearly you are delusional and unaware of the fact that no country is going to join the EU for at least the next decade but there's a very good chance that nobody is joining ever again. Go ask the citizens of northern Europe how they feel about letting anyone else in. There are major winds of change in Europe right now and they are blowing against EU integration. I'm sure everyone is so damn eager to let Greater Albania transpire in the greater EU.

@Aleks

I have never cared for Illyrians and I will never care for them. Outside of my curiosity on say Balkan history, it makes zero difference to me whether it be proven conclusively that Albanians descent from them, or from people in South Africa. It is not the reason for my stance on Kosovo and its never going to be. However, I do know Albanian history well enough to know that the idea that Albanians come from Turkey is redundant and not taken seriously by any historian that I consider credible. Frankly, the only connection that I can see being pulled to support this, is the Islamic faith. However, faith is something that is adopted, I can conceivably be persuaded by Orthodox theism and convert, it wouldn't make me a Greek, or a Serb, or a Bulgar. After all, if Albanians did come from Turkey, then how do you explain the very obvious and easily demonstrated connection between Albanians today and the Arberesh of Italy? I should add, that where Albanians come from, makes no difference to me, nor will it shape my politics on Balkan affairs. That it does for some people, I can't do anything about. That's their problem

@ Leonidas

Your theorising, would imply that Albania was never inhabited by Albanians until the Ottomans came to town. I have never read anyone that claims that, ever. If you have, I'd really like for you to share those sources. My point on language remains, a classified Indo-European one, not a Turkic one. You're unhappy, then do what I suggested, go into Albanology and publish your own work. I am not stopping you, nor is anyone else for that matter. As for Albania being an artificial creation, I'm actually curios to know what means. After all, all states and nations are artificial creations, they are social constructs, that's all. Ultimately, we're all human beings. Take away language and Serbs and Albanians are the same. However, you have taken the view, that Albanians are interlopers, apparently not only in Kosovo, but also in Albania. OK, so tell me, which people were living in Tirana, or Durres in the 12 th century, before the Ottomans showed up?

ETHNIC ALBANIA,

I find your arguments really amusing: 'the majority of the population of Greece are East African . You mean that e.g. in S. Greece, the Aegean and Ionian Islands, Crete etc the majority are East African in 20th c.? Very funny.Not even Enver Hoxha. would ever make such a claim! As for your DNA myths, there is nothing more to say that when you are unable to produce concrete evidence to support your pseudo-historical myths about Albanian precedence in the Balkans. you revert to 'biological evidence'.Do you know how many other research reports say the opposite? But any serious historian (and DNA expert) would simply tell you that almost all modern peoples (especially in the Balkans) are more or less the offspring of some degree of merger. Do you think that all Greeks, Bulgarians, Turks, Germans look the same? Do you think the massive Turkish presence in Albania and Kosovo had no effects on the alleged Albanian purity?
Enjoy your ILLYRIAN myths.

My personal opinion on this is that after 500 years of ottoman occupation, Serbs Albanians and Greeks have more genes in common with the Turks than their ancient descendants they pretend to be from and all this discussion is kind of pointless.
(jinx, 14 November 2014 18:29)

As I said in my previous posting no serious historian would ever claim that modern peoples are direct descendants of ancient peoples, at least in terms of DNA but let me clarify a couple of points in your posting.Firstly,Greece wasn't 500 years under the Ottomans as you suggest.South of Greece and the Islands were under the Venetians until the middle of 15th century.Secondly,Greece declared its independence in 1822 whereas most of the Balkans gained theirs many years later.Finally,your assertion about common genes with the Turks is disputed by the world ancestry map.

http://admixturemap.paintmychromosomes.com/

"Rama salutes group displaying Greater Albania map"

Must be a total misinterpretation. I'm totally sure Rama didn't salute them, but only told them that their map shows an 'obsolete myth'.

@Nikolle

That Illyrian argument is used by 99.99% of the Albanians here without having any understanding of it at all. Zero. Just what some books written by Albanians claim about it, and everyone is brainwashed into false belief. You're right though, those are all semantics and really pointless. This is how I see it. Albanians most likely descended from the Albani clan/tribe from the Illyrians. There are some who descended from Turks (they dominated the region for 500 years, how could they not), some probably from Greeks, Italians, it's quite likely some even descended from Serbs. The point is moot though, because today you have Albanians. They are Albanians, their own ethnicity.

Serbs have dated back from their region for roughly 1,000 years (including Kosovo). What was there 2,000 years ago? Who knows. What we do know is today it's Serbia. Some may be descendants from the Roman empire, an Illyrian clan/tribe, some most likely from Turks (again, they ruled for centuries there), some could be from Albania, some from Bulgaria...it has all culminated to today. One thing I do know, for centuries upon centuries, there is a huge Serbian culture and history in Kosovo and not much of an Albanian save for the last 50-100 years. Evidence nobody can deny. The Albanian population in the last 100 years or so grew, even became a majority in many parts, but it was in Serbian territory. Albanians had no right to ask for that land, nor do they have a right to take it.

Nikolle, do you even know what Illyrians were? Do you honestly believe that all Illyrians are ancestors to Albanians? You, like the rest of the Albanians, are so twisted and brain washed that you just repeat what you were told. I suppose Chinese people, who are considered Asian, can claim all of Asia then? If a German is European, that all of Europe must be German? Illyrians were composed of several clans and tribal regions, in a similar way to being European or Asian today.

While there is historic evidence that Albanians may have been from an Illyrian clan or tribe (note the word Illyrian clan or tribe), there were several factions of them. One of them was the Albani, which appeared in what is pretty much today's modern day Albania. The Albani were just one small part, one clan/tribe of the Illyrians. The Albani were not rulers of the entire Balkans, were not in present day Croatia, Bosnia, Serbia, or even Kosovo. They were for the most part where they are today.

At one time the Balkans were under the Roman empire all the way to Turkey and on up to England. They were all called Romans, but they all had their clans, tribes, or ethnicity. Much like Asian and European is a general term today, Illyrian was a general term back then. Albanians are not descendants from every Illyrian, nor do they hold claim to all the lands they keep saying they do...sadly they use the Illyrian excuse for it, yet are clueless to the truth.

If only Albania was located a bit more east than we could claim them to be Arabic, or maybe a bit more south and then we could say they are African. But since they lie so close to central europe well they must be allians...

This is pathetic, I cant believe people are so delusional not willing to accept that they are all the same people. If you just look at the indo european language family tree you will find that Albanian was one of the original languages and it did not branch off something else.

Not claiming this as proof but here are some quich Albanian-English lessons:
liroje (Redeem)
I liria (The freedom)
I lire (The fee)

@Leonidas
....Thousands of Turkish nomads were brought and settled in the occupied areas...
Now we just have to prove that those nomads were albanians and finally the mystery is solved, we finally know where the bastards come from.
Why dont you write a research paper on the origin of albanians while you are at it. Sesejl can certainly make use of it.
Why, we as a nation are so obsessed with the origin of Albanians?
Why are we so bothered by the fact that albanians were natives to the balkans as they claim to be?
If we prove that they somehow arrived here in 15th century, does that give us a historical right to ethnically cleanse them and commit state organised murder, rape and genocide in the 21st century?
If we claim to be the god chosen heavenly people, with thousand of years of civilization and history, why did we fall in total savagery only 20 years ago?
Are we really better than Albanians , Croats or Bosnians?
This is the question you should ask yourself instead of your historical gibberish.

@alex
your argument is fallacious as it is only valid for a period of time of your choosing and not universal.
Most European culture is a heritage from the roman empire.
Does that give a claim to Rome on all european lands today?
The majority of independent scholars seem to accept that albanians are decent of ancient Illyrian tribes, and they do seem to be the only ones who did not assimilate completely into other cultures.
Granted, there might have been 100 of Illyrian tribes but they all assimilated as we have no traces of them in modern times.
Albanians were probably the most stubborn or dumb or both and did not assimilate for whatever reason. So most probably they were there when the Serbs arrived and probably when the Hellens arrived too.
The problem we have with Albania is that we all want them to be from somewhere else rather than natives but cant find a plausible place where they came from other than their present land today. And a lot of Serb and Greek scholars have done huge research to try and prove that Albanians just came from somewhere else but were not successful.
Now that Albania is a free country, maybe more research will be done and we will finally know more about these crazy people.
My personal opinion on this is that after 500 years of ottoman occupation, Serbs Albanians and Greeks have more genes in common with the Turks than their ancient descendants they pretend to be from and all this discussion is kind of pointless.

@Leonidas
I always found it amusing how little we talk about our turkish heritage in Serbia, it is as hundred of years of occupation never happened.
With the exception of the church and languages that managed to survive, evth else in the balkans is mainly turkish in heritage.
Look, our favorite foods are kebab, sarma, burek and we drink rakija. They are all turkish foods and drinks.
Most greek kitchen is really turkish also. And it is impossible to distinguish a greek from a turk or serb or albanian in general. All this denial is beacuse deep in side we think we are a superior nation which is a racist trait and has brought so much suffering on our people.
How is possible that people of all races can co-habit in Western Europe, yet we balkan people, so similar, with so much common heritage, hate each other so much and commit some of the worst savageries in modern times?

Now we just have to prove that those nomads were albanians.

Who said they were Albanians.You asked me to read Ottoman history and when I come with a link -i can send you a few more- you complain.Personally I couldn't careless whether the Albanians originated from the Illyrians or the Daleks.

Why, we as a nation are so obsessed with the origin of Albanians?

Who is we? You may be obsessed I am not.

Why are we so bothered by the fact that albanians were natives to the balkans as they claim to be?

Well the Albanians use the argument in order to create precedence over their neighbours to achieve more land grab.It's not an accident that past and present Albanian prime ministers have been shouting from the top of the roof great albania.

This is the question you should ask yourself instead of your historical gibberish.

My historical "gibberish" is based on work carried out by Turkish historians -amongst others-who derived statistics and all other relevant information from Ottoman archives.I am not forcing you to accept it.

do you know why that is boom, because the Balkans are still dealing with their own nationalism, which has the anti-Ottoman narrative at its base. Ultimately, people in the Balkans have built their own myths which they now find it hard to snap out of. I wonder how many would accept that actually a lot of Balkan rulers invited the Ottomans over. a lot of them even gladly served for them. of course, the first one to make a deal with the Empire was a Greek Byzantine ruler by the name of Cantacuzenus, this I find bothers a lot of Greeks today, for reasons which I honestly can't get my head round. those were difference times when people lived by different ideas. it seems common sense to me to assume that a lot of people in the Balkans today would have some Turkish DNA in them, unless people honestly believe that 500 years of Ottoman rule leaves no imprint at all, in which case they're just lying to themselves

@Leonidas
you need to read some history books on the ottoman empire, not those written by serb or greek or albanian scholars. If anything your DNA link shows that the balkan people have more in common with turks than any other nation, I dont know what you want to achieve.
Is your personal life such a failure that you are trying to claim some of the glory of the past for yourself by saying that you are the son of Zeus by blood? Get a life and do smth yourself instead of indulging in useless racist crap.

boom,

Obviously, you have no idea what you are talking about: you mix up Food, drinks, DNA and you produce an (un-)historical cocktail which you call heritage.Heritage is always understood or defined as tangible and intangible and by tangible I mean historic buildings which were passed down from previous generations and are worth preserving whereas intangible heritage practices are defined such as language, culture, popular song,religion, literature or dress.None of these heritage practices is connected with Turkey in any shape or form.

Your assertion again that popular food (if you can give it this description) such as Kebab or Raki drink is Turkish is totally wrong.Kebab did originate from Persia and expanded into Middle Eastern countries whereas the Cretans in Greece have been producing Raki or Tsikoudia(Greek) when the Turks were still in Mongolia.Your next sweeping statement that Greek cuisine is Turkish is utter rubbish.You must've heard for "Mediterranean Diet" rich in fish and green and has been around for thousands of years.If you also look at a Greek food bible you'll see a substantial number of pork dishes.Are they Turkish?As to your other sweeping statement that all Balkan people look the same is laughable.I don't deny there was a degree of mingling between Christian Orthodox people but certainly not with Muslims.Do you know what "apostasy" means in Christian Orthodox?

it seems common sense to me to assume that a lot of people in the Balkans today would have some Turkish DNA in them, unless people honestly believe that 500 years of Ottoman rule leaves no imprint at all, in which case they're just lying to themselves
(Nikolle,

There is no need to believe anything or assume anything, Nikolle.In addition to the link of the genetic map that I’ve posted below there is also an official genetic map of Europe which is the product of EU research. It shows Greece to be the most genetically diverse country in Europe but still the biggest part of the population is descended from the ancient people, who were also of mixed stock.There were also large numbers of Greeks returning to Greece in Roman and medieval times so the population was getting replenished regularly. You can read about this on Eupedia. But as I've said before no contemporary historian will use DNA results to determine links between modern people and ancients.

you need to read some history books on the ottoman empire, not those written by serb or greek or albanian scholars.

This what I did.If you did read one of my postings below I did quote the work carried out by Turkish historians which of course are not popular with Albanians because their narrative is completely opposite to the Albanian one. Talip Kucukcan (Re-claiming identity:Ethnicity,religion& Turkish Muslims)argues that during Beyazid II rule (1481-15120 the Ottoman Turks changed the demographic structure in the Balkans.Thousands of Turkish nomads were brought and settled in the occupied areas.

If anything your DNA link shows that the balkan people have more in common with turks than any other nation

I am not sure you've read the same map because the one below shows there is no connection with the Turks or Albanians.If you click on Italy you'll find many similarities between Italians and Greeks.

Is your personal life such a failure that you are trying to claim some of the glory of the past?

My personal life is fulfilled both culturally and materially and I have never claimed ancestry from Zeus or anybody else-unlike the Albanian crowd which never fail to remind us of their fake Illyrian ancestry.

Someone who exposes your ignorance and lies is not necessarily racist.

There is something you Serbs and all the world need to understand: This is not the map of GREAT Albania, This is the map of ETHNIC Albania.
A Great Serbia, Great Greece means wiping out foreign territories from their autochthonous inhabitants and occupying them.
While ETHNIC Albania means uniting territories inhabited since thousands of years by Albanians! But divided so badly in 1913 between 5 countries by Great European powers at that time! This is the main reason why Albanians hates Europe which was very unfair towards us throughout our history and to understand the hate between Serbs and Albanians you have to go deeper in history. We are a small nation in Europe but proud people.Cheers 

Don't the Serbs realise that the Albanian people are increasingly getting stronger. Who on the Earth would even attempt to stop the push for a Greater Albania. It's only a matter of time.

Greetings from the United States of Albania- USA.

Non- Slavic

All Natural

Indigenous

Shiperia

Rama got you all Serbs shook up. He told you in your PMs face to recognize Kosova, and what did you do? Complain about it as usual. A natural Albanian map is not Ramas fault. That's just the way we've been divided, and what has been done unfair will be undone to make it right. We all witnessed the greater serbia project, by wiping out all non serbians. We don't have to do ghat, we will have meaningless borders between countries where Albanians live. Same goes for serbians in north, they have that opportunity why shouldn't we? We have to make it fair for all serbians are not any special.

@ ETHNIC ALBANIAN, enough with your BS pipe dreams. Albanians have no history or culture. Your so called people have achieved nothing except for crime, terror and poverty and it continues to this day. So please spare us from you're drug induced fairy tales. Albanians belong in the slums of Turkey and the middle east from where they came from

So it is OK for the Serbian President to seat in the same stadium were the 30 000 Serbian fans shouting Death to Albanians and it's not OK when somehow one person displays the Ethnic Albania Map and Rama is the bad guy here ..... Really?
I also find it ironic for Vucic to complaining to same ambassadors France. USA who bombed and recognized Kosovo and they actually say same thing Rama said on press conference.
Ari Gold think about it before you trash someone who you really don't know him at all.
And FYI His brother really was harassed in Belgrade and a cussed wrongly by top gov officials.
You guys are doing just same this time with Edi Rama
respect

Thats not true be92, either way what was he supposed to say to them to go f*** themselves ?

@ Leeonidas,

Since I am young and not found of history,

Dose Masacre of Racak(Kosovo) 15 January 1999 ring any bell. Check wikipedia and maybe you will understand why "NATO" bombarded you moron.

I'm confused as to who to believe now. The list of places Albanians come from, as put forward by commentators on B92:

Turkey
Sicily
Azerbaijan
Arabian Peninsula
Middle East

Make up your minds, we never change ours

A Great Serbia, Great Greece means wiping out foreign territories from their autochthonous inhabitants and occupying them.
(ETHNIC ALBANIA

There's nothing more laughable than Albanians talking about history which they hardly know. So Greece and Serbia committed massacres against Albanian populations. Can you name the years and places that those "massacres" took place backed by a historical authority on the subject?As to your claim that Albanians being "autochthonous"in the Balkans the history of Greece didn't start with the Ottomans but 4000 years before that. What Albanians claim as "Albanian" land is really nothing other than former Ottoman possessions.Maybe a read on the Muslims settling in the Balkans during the rule of the Ottomans Murad IV and Suleiman II could help you to learn more about your race( a reading list of Turkish historians is readily available).The truth is the ancestors of modern-day Albanians were nothing more than petty thieves and cut-throats employed by the Ottomans as enforcers on the occupied lands which the often cleansed of their original Christian inhabitants.
Albanians should be more than happy with what they've managed to steal from their neighbours but if they continue with their wild nationalist dreams they will definitely lose their lot.

(ETHNIC ALBANIA, 12 November 2014 11:28)

I don't think most people care what you call your sick project of territorial expansion. "ethnic Albania", "greater Albania", it makes no difference. The goal remains the same, unite Albania with the hundreds of thousands of Albanians that got the hell out of Albania to find a better life.

But in order to achieve this, you will have to go to war with 4 real countries. I don't know how you plan on winning, but I urge you to try. You guys really are proud, though I am not too certain for what achievements exactly. But you should channel this pride into achieving your expansions ASAP.

And if you can defeat all 4 of your neighbors for their land, you deserve it. My humble prediction is that because you wont have the strongest military alliance on the planet acting as your air force, you will fail and fail miserably. But let's see what really happens.

Rama is a snake. He only lies when he opens his mouth. With backward politicians like Rama Albania will remain the armpit of Europe.

@leonidas
you seem to be pretty well versed in history.
Could you please show us some links or evidence supporting your theory, or are you just regurgitating the old serb national propaganda vomit.
thanks

The only threat to Serbia, and to the world for that matter, is America and its poodles in the NATO Pact. Albania has no capacity to hurt its neighbours and it is not Albania that now occupies Kosovo, it's the "Murcans."

US power and wealth appears to be disappearing as quickly as British power did after WW2. Once the US Dollar becomes merely a local currency and not an international currency, then US interventions abroad will virtually cease. US Navy ships will rust in their home docks and 1000 foreign military bases will be abandoned. I don't know if this will take 5 years or 20 years to complete, but my guess is that the US Empire will end quickly.

With US Empire gone I suspect the Albanian PM will show more respect to his neighbours.

Have these underemployed individuals got nothing better to do than wave flags around. Quite a sad and sorry site.

Could you please show us some links or evidence supporting your theory, or are you just regurgitating the old serb national propaganda vomit.
thanks
(whocares, 12 November 2014 16:58)

Everything you ever wanted to know about Albanian history (as of 2014. Warning, content subject to change with shifting agendas and goals)

http://uncyclopedia.wikia.com/wiki/Albania

very interesting. place names tell us nothing about demographics, they only assert who the ruling people were, that's all. there is a reason why Constantinople is now called Istanbul. either way, I have read Noel Malcolm's book and he does in it, that it is most likely Albanians come from Illyrians. not that it matters to me, nor does it shape my opinions on politics, because even if Albanians came from South Africa, my opinion on Kosovo would stay the same. however, the Albanian language is a classified Indo-European one, it means its not Turkic, nor is it Middle Eastern, nor is it Arabic. so we can now rule that continent out. if you have an issue with this classification, do the following, enrol in the Institute of Albanology, publish your scholarly work that demonstrates a clear connection between the Albanian language and that of Turkish and show where people are wrong. not on person is stopping, because if you were right, it would mean, that Albania itself was never populated by Albanians until relatively recently. That however, I have never read anyone claim ever.

@leonidas
"The modern Greeks, as we know, have no relationship to the Latins, nor for that matter with the ancient Greeks. Modern anthropology has shown that they are brachycephalous Slavs, while the ancient Greeks were dolichocephalous, which fact is sufficient to establish an absolutely fundamental separation between the modern Greeks and their pretended ancestors."
("The Psychology of Socialism" by Gustave Le Bon, page 206)

@leonidas
The atrocities committed against the Cham Albanians by the Greek state during W.W.I are called the Albanian Genocide. Genocide is the organized killing of a people for the express purpose of putting an end to their collective existence. Because of its scope, genocide requires central planning and a machinery to implement it. This makes genocide the quintessential state crime as only a government has the resources to carry out such a scheme of destruction. The Albanian Genocide was centrally planned and administered by the Greek government against the entire Albanian population in South Epirus. It was carried out during W.W.I The Cham Albanian people were subjected to deportation, expropriation, abduction, torture, massacre, and starvation. The great bulk of the Cham population was forcibly removed from South Epirus to Albania and Turkey, where the vast majority was sent into hell to die of thirst and hunger. Large numbers of Cham Albanians were methodically massacred by Greeks. Women and children were abducted and horribly abused. The entire wealth of the Cham Albanian was expropriated. After only a little more than a year of calm at the end of W.W.I, the atrocities were renewed between 1920 and 1923, and the remaining of Cham Albanians were subjected to further massacres and expulsions.

(Leonidas@
If you really think that Slavs are the native people in Balkan peninsula older than Illyrians and Hellenes than you must recognize FYROM as Republic of Macedonia and give them the northern eastern part of Greece. RIGHT?

It's kind of good he saw that this so-called "obsolete myth" is still taken seriously in outside his beloved kingdom among his less enlightened and tolerant subjects. Can't say he really appreciated it, though I'm sure he got a warm fuzzy feeling nonetheless.

But more importantly, who cares? Other than the handful of internet yokels who actually think this is around the corner, "Autochthonous Albania" is "Fictitious Albania" and the first and only Greater Whatever project to be thrown in the dustbin of history before it even started. I'm so done with Rama's wasted and unproductive trip to Serbia which may have pleased a handful of eurocrats in Brussels, but did nothing to mend fences between Serbia and Albania. If anything, Rama showed he's a horrible guest who frequently goes off script to score points and Vucic showed he's an immature host who can't even keep it together for a relative nobody on the diplomatic front. Thank goodness this charade is over. See you in another 68 years. Don't let the door hit you on the rear on your way back to Tirana.

Rama is a snake. He only lies when he opens his mouth. With backward politicians like Rama Albania will remain the armpit of Europe.
(So sad, too bad, 12 November 2014 10:27)

You got it all wrong man. He says things as they are. You may not like him, or what he has ta say but he will speak his mind anywhere and everywhere. As a matter of fact I don't like him. However you have to give credit where credit is due. He doesn't just talk to the talk but also walk the walk. He has the signs to prove it. He is one of the main founders of the democratic movement against Hoxha's regime. He had his skull cracked open because he spoke against any and every sign of dictatorship, and he still has the bullets from snipers trying to kill him through the windows of his own home; again, because he's always spoken against the corrupt and powerful. Right now he's the only politician in the Balkans who will not mince words and try to fool you. He despises nationalism and any sign of autocracy. He's been like that since his early days as an artist. He's highly intelligent and he believes in the United Europe with all his being. He's the antithesis of what you have in Belgrade. He will be the first one to invite Vucic to yell at the top of his lungs whatever he wants in Tirana, because he believes free spech is free everywhere and enytime: Belgrade, Tirana etc. He puts his lif on the line for his beliefs. He should move faster with his changes. He's too slow right now.

Nikolle

Contemporary historiography clarifies that "there is no conclusive evidence that "Albanians" constituted the majority of the population in Kosovo or Albania prior to the Ottoman occupation". Even the "pro-Albanian" history written by Noel Malcolm concedes that "the region probably had a predominantly Orthodox Christian and Slavic population from the eight to the mid-nineteenth centuries". A majority of the names given in the charters are overwhelmingly Slavic rather than Albanian. This has been interpreted as evidence of an overwhelming Serbian majority. This claim is also supported by the Ottoman tax census (defter) of 1455 which considered both religion and language and found that the majority of the population were Slavic.In fact the Albanian narrative that Kosovo was always Albanian is contradicted mostly by Turkish historians. Talip Kucukean in Recclaiming identity and Akkayan (1979) Migration In, From, and to Southeastern Europe: Historical and cultural aspects both state when the Turks conquered Kosovo it was mainly inhabited by few thousand Roman Christians (there were no ethnicities at the time) and subsequently the Ottomans transported thousands of Turkish nomads into Balkans in order to change the demographics and Implement the Milliyet system.To answer your question I will quote the Albanians favourite historian Malcolm who said " It's a mystery when and where the Albanians came from".Does it sound Illyrian?

(ETHNIC ALBANIA, 12 November 2014 11:28)

I don't think most people care what you call your sick project of territorial expansion. "ethnic Albania", "greater Albania", it makes no difference. The goal remains the same, unite Albania with the hundreds of thousands of Albanians that got the hell out of Albania to find a better life.

But in order to achieve this, you will have to go to war with 4 real countries. I don't know how you plan on winning, but I urge you to try. You guys really are proud, though I am not too certain for what achievements exactly. But you should channel this pride into achieving your expansions ASAP.

And if you can defeat all 4 of your neighbors for their land, you deserve it. My humble prediction is that because you wont have the strongest military alliance on the planet acting as your air force, you will fail and fail miserably. But let's see what really happens.
(Ari Gold, 12 November 2014 12:06)

no need for war, 2 albanian states in the balkans so far, macedonia will be the third albanian states...do you know what that means, once this region enter EU, and the EU parliament, Albanians will have 3 votes, and thats how you become powerful :) good bye

Who on the Earth would even attempt to stop the push for a Greater Albania.
(Bam Bam, 12 November 2014 12:14)

The same states that stopped every other Greater project in the 1990s and the 1940s. Your question also suggests Albania has the capacity to launch such a campaign when they can barely take care of their own in Albania, let alone assist in irredentism abroad. But no surprise you fall for the rhetoric seeing as how you also jerk off to NDH fantasies when you need to be Croatian.

If you really think that Slavs are the native people in Balkan peninsula older than Illyrians and Hellenes than you must recognize FYROM as Republic of Macedonia and give them the northern eastern part of Greece. RIGHT?
(ETHNIC ALBANIA

I haven't said the Slavs are older than Illyrians .What I have said is Albanians are not Illyrians.

The term ethnic cleansing was apparently used by the Albanians in Kosovo.

Not so innocent.

no need for war, 2 albanian states in the balkans so far, macedonia will be the third albanian states...do you know what that means, once this region enter EU, and the EU parliament, Albanians will have 3 votes, and thats how you become powerful :) good bye
(eric, 13 November 2014 04:43)
You poor deluded fool. If you think that you’ll get anything out of Brussels you are living in ga ga land. The system will be rigged where you’re lucky to have one vote. Do you think that Brussels has dropped out of the tree yesterday to allow this to happen? LOL Brussels does not need more social security beneficiaries nor do they want Muslims to have any power or say in Europe.
You guys have been going backwards for so long that the west has no convinced you that you’re actually forward.

Edi Rama talks about Greater Albania being a myth, that nobody wants it, but he refuses to condemn the idea. Instead, he drops his subtle hints about it. For example, stopping to salute these people with the Greater Albania flag. Besides stoking that notion, it also reveals his true feelings. Then in Presevo on Tuesday, a city in Serbia, he makes this statement......He also told those present that the Albanian people "are not dreaming about creating a Greater Albania but a Greater Europe that will include all Albanian territories." ........ So, he comes out to speak against Greater Albania yet speaks of 'Albanian territories'. It's quite obvious that he considers Presevo an Albanian territory. That was a question he should have been asked but wasn't. Anyhow, his statement shows it. So if he thinks that, along with parts of Montenegro, Macedonia, and Greece are Albanian territories, then he is for a Greater Albania. Period.

He is playing politician and playing words exceptionally well. He knew he would get the reaction he did from Serbia with his Kosovo rhetoric. Then he quickly says Greater Albania is not in his interest, while talking about 'Albanian territory' in Serbia. It's obvious what he is doing, and what the agenda is. A real politician would have told the crowd in Presevo he is not their prime minister and to work hard for a better life in Serbia for all Albanians. Instead, he used the term 'Albanian territories'.

It’s going to be a big shock to these Albos that a greater Albania will never take place. These simple people think that they have the population and Brussels must support that population with social security by closing schools and hospitals in the EU and redirecting that money to them.
Lads, that ship has truly sailed. No more money.

@Aleks

I have never cared for Illyrians and I will never care for them. Outside of my curiosity on say Balkan history, it makes zero difference to me whether it be proven conclusively that Albanians descent from them, or from people in South Africa. It is not the reason for my stance on Kosovo and its never going to be. However, I do know Albanian history well enough to know that the idea that Albanians come from Turkey is redundant and not taken seriously by any historian that I consider credible. Frankly, the only connection that I can see being pulled to support this, is the Islamic faith. However, faith is something that is adopted, I can conceivably be persuaded by Orthodox theism and convert, it wouldn't make me a Greek, or a Serb, or a Bulgar. After all, if Albanians did come from Turkey, then how do you explain the very obvious and easily demonstrated connection between Albanians today and the Arberesh of Italy? I should add, that where Albanians come from, makes no difference to me, nor will it shape my politics on Balkan affairs. That it does for some people, I can't do anything about. That's their problem

@Nikolle

That Illyrian argument is used by 99.99% of the Albanians here without having any understanding of it at all. Zero. Just what some books written by Albanians claim about it, and everyone is brainwashed into false belief. You're right though, those are all semantics and really pointless. This is how I see it. Albanians most likely descended from the Albani clan/tribe from the Illyrians. There are some who descended from Turks (they dominated the region for 500 years, how could they not), some probably from Greeks, Italians, it's quite likely some even descended from Serbs. The point is moot though, because today you have Albanians. They are Albanians, their own ethnicity.

Serbs have dated back from their region for roughly 1,000 years (including Kosovo). What was there 2,000 years ago? Who knows. What we do know is today it's Serbia. Some may be descendants from the Roman empire, an Illyrian clan/tribe, some most likely from Turks (again, they ruled for centuries there), some could be from Albania, some from Bulgaria...it has all culminated to today. One thing I do know, for centuries upon centuries, there is a huge Serbian culture and history in Kosovo and not much of an Albanian save for the last 50-100 years. Evidence nobody can deny. The Albanian population in the last 100 years or so grew, even became a majority in many parts, but it was in Serbian territory. Albanians had no right to ask for that land, nor do they have a right to take it.

"That Illyrian argument is used by 99.99% of the Albanians here without having any understanding of it at all. "

OK, I can only tell you what I think. I don't have time for people who use this we-were-here-first argument because its flippant. To me, its immaterial who came here first. We have to deal with what is now, not what was here 2000 years ago. Now your view is that Albanians grew in size and became a majority, however, that Kosovo has had a sizeable Albanian population for at least the last 300 years, is pretty well attested. Maybe not as much of a clear majority as now, but a sizeable presence none the less. Thing is though, even if your theory was true, it still wouldn't make Serbia's argument valid. Ultimately I wouldn't even support Kosovo independence had Serbia shown clarity in the 1990's and not engaged in brutality over its citizens of Albanian ethnicity. Frankly there is no other choice, because when over 90% of those who dwell here don't want to be a part of Serbia, it becomes a problem. If you think logically, its not even in Serbia's interest to keep it and I'll tell you why, because although the Albanian birthrate is now in decline, its still growing faster than that of Serbs, so if current trends should continue, within 60 years Albanians will become a majority in the whole of Serbia. This is just one argument, I have many others

ETHNIC ALBANIA,

I find your arguments really amusing: 'the majority of the population of Greece are East African . You mean that e.g. in S. Greece, the Aegean and Ionian Islands, Crete etc the majority are East African in 20th c.? Very funny.Not even Enver Hoxha. would ever make such a claim! As for your DNA myths, there is nothing more to say that when you are unable to produce concrete evidence to support your pseudo-historical myths about Albanian precedence in the Balkans. you revert to 'biological evidence'.Do you know how many other research reports say the opposite? But any serious historian (and DNA expert) would simply tell you that almost all modern peoples (especially in the Balkans) are more or less the offspring of some degree of merger. Do you think that all Greeks, Bulgarians, Turks, Germans look the same? Do you think the massive Turkish presence in Albania and Kosovo had no effects on the alleged Albanian purity?
Enjoy your ILLYRIAN myths.

ETHNIC ALBANIA,

What a speech.How could the Greek state do such a thing to such a lovely bunch of people like the chams? The Ottoman enforcers,killers and enslavers of thousands of Greeks.Do you know of the crimes the Egyptian /Albanian Ibrahim Pasha and the Chams committed during the Greek war of independence? Thousands of women ,children killed and sold in Peloponnese on the slave bazaars of Turkey and Egypt.The Chams were lucky to escape with their lives back to Turkey.The ones left in Greece never forgot their trade and during World War II alligned themselves with Fascist Italy and Germany and helped the Germans sent all the Jews from Epirus to concentration camps.This is what British Colonel Chris Woodhouse, head of the Allied Military Mission in Greece said about the Chams:
"Chams are racially part Turk, part Albanian.In 1941-3 they collaborated with Italians, making the organization of guerilla resistance in that area difficult. Zervas encouraged by the Allied Mission, chased them out of their homes in 1944 in order to facilitate operations against the enemy. They mostly took refuge in Albania, where they were not popular either. Their eviction from Greece was bloodily carried out, which was fed by many brutalities committed by the Chams in league with the Italians.The Chams deserved what they got. The result has been in effect a shift of populations, removing an unwanted minority from Greek soil. Perhaps it would be best to leave things at that”.

@ Leonidas

Your theorising, would imply that Albania was never inhabited by Albanians until the Ottomans came to town. I have never read anyone that claims that, ever. If you have, I'd really like for you to share those sources. My point on language remains, a classified Indo-European one, not a Turkic one. You're unhappy, then do what I suggested, go into Albanology and publish your own work. I am not stopping you, nor is anyone else for that matter. As for Albania being an artificial creation, I'm actually curios to know what means. After all, all states and nations are artificial creations, they are social constructs, that's all. Ultimately, we're all human beings. Take away language and Serbs and Albanians are the same. However, you have taken the view, that Albanians are interlopers, apparently not only in Kosovo, but also in Albania. OK, so tell me, which people were living in Tirana, or Durres in the 12 th century, before the Ottomans showed up?

@leonidas
The Albanian race was settled in the Balkan Peninsula before the Hellenes arrived and centuries upon centuries before the Serbs were heard of in the civilized world. Pyrrhus, Alexander the Great, Scanderbeg were of that race. The Independent, Volume 107 Leonard Bacon, Joseph Parrish Thompson, Richard Salter Storrs Education - 1921 (Page 9)
There is not such a thing as ''greek tribes'',because the greeks existed since 19th century,as a national group!According to the latest DNA tests,modern Greeks have 32% of East African blood in them,31% middle eastern,15%central Asian and only 11% Balkanic. Meaning,Greeks are FOREIGN to the land they inhabit.They're a mixture of Jews,Turks,Slavs,Albanians,Vlachs etc.The difference between them and the ancient Greeks is like from Athens to Tokyo.People lie,DNA doesn't.

@alex
your argument is fallacious as it is only valid for a period of time of your choosing and not universal.
Most European culture is a heritage from the roman empire.
Does that give a claim to Rome on all european lands today?
The majority of independent scholars seem to accept that albanians are decent of ancient Illyrian tribes, and they do seem to be the only ones who did not assimilate completely into other cultures.
Granted, there might have been 100 of Illyrian tribes but they all assimilated as we have no traces of them in modern times.
Albanians were probably the most stubborn or dumb or both and did not assimilate for whatever reason. So most probably they were there when the Serbs arrived and probably when the Hellens arrived too.
The problem we have with Albania is that we all want them to be from somewhere else rather than natives but cant find a plausible place where they came from other than their present land today. And a lot of Serb and Greek scholars have done huge research to try and prove that Albanians just came from somewhere else but were not successful.
Now that Albania is a free country, maybe more research will be done and we will finally know more about these crazy people.
My personal opinion on this is that after 500 years of ottoman occupation, Serbs Albanians and Greeks have more genes in common with the Turks than their ancient descendants they pretend to be from and all this discussion is kind of pointless.

"The modern Greeks, as we know, have no relationship to the Latins, nor for that matter with the ancient Greeks. Modern anthropology has shown that they are brachycephalous Slavs, while the ancient Greeks were dolichocephalous, which fact is sufficient to establish an absolutely fundamental separation between the modern Greeks and their pretended ancestors."
("The Psychology of Socialism" by Gustave Le Bon, page 206)
(ETHNIC ALBANIA, 13 November 2014 11:51)

No serious historian would ever claim that modern peoples are direct descendants of ancient peoples, at least in terms of DNA. What really matters is continuation (e.g. culture, language, occasionally religion) which ensures the historical sense of an evolving community through time.In other words, modern Greeks have many features enabling them to look back to antiquity.

Nikolle,

The fact that Constantinople was renamed Istanbul is because of conquest and not because the Turks had ancient roots in those lands.Demographics don't establish ancestry.Malcolm is going around the bush and doesn't make a claim of Illyrian and Albanian connections.In fact he diverts all the research of the subject into linguistics which have established the fact that Albanian and Illyrian have little or nothing in common, judging from the handful of Illyrian words that archaeologists have retrieved. In fact the two inscriptions found to date one reads in Greek when turned upside down and the other is blank.It's worth mentioning what the views of the Austrian linguists on the matter.As Matzinger-the Austrian linguist said-“You’ll find the doctrine about the Illyrian origin of Albanians everywhere,from popular to scientific literature and schoolbooks. “There is no discussion about this, it’s a fact. They say, ‘We are Illyrians’ and that’s that,”.Their far fetched claims of Illyrian descent and being indigenous to the region have become masks for greater Albania.It can be said that modern Albania is as much of an artificial creation as Fyrom without a history of state building or of establishing unique historical traditions. It emerged as an Austro-Hungarian project in 1913 of blocking Serbian expansion in the south and ever since Albanians have always been dependent on outside help to survive.

"Rama salutes group displaying Greater Albania map"

Must be a total misinterpretation. I'm totally sure Rama didn't salute them, but only told them that their map shows an 'obsolete myth'.

no need for war, 2 albanian states in the balkans so far, macedonia will be the third albanian states...do you know what that means, once this region enter EU, and the EU parliament, Albanians will have 3 votes, and thats how you become powerful :) good bye
(eric, 13 November 2014 04:43)

Clearly you are delusional and unaware of the fact that no country is going to join the EU for at least the next decade but there's a very good chance that nobody is joining ever again. Go ask the citizens of northern Europe how they feel about letting anyone else in. There are major winds of change in Europe right now and they are blowing against EU integration. I'm sure everyone is so damn eager to let Greater Albania transpire in the greater EU.

Nikolle, do you even know what Illyrians were? Do you honestly believe that all Illyrians are ancestors to Albanians? You, like the rest of the Albanians, are so twisted and brain washed that you just repeat what you were told. I suppose Chinese people, who are considered Asian, can claim all of Asia then? If a German is European, that all of Europe must be German? Illyrians were composed of several clans and tribal regions, in a similar way to being European or Asian today.

While there is historic evidence that Albanians may have been from an Illyrian clan or tribe (note the word Illyrian clan or tribe), there were several factions of them. One of them was the Albani, which appeared in what is pretty much today's modern day Albania. The Albani were just one small part, one clan/tribe of the Illyrians. The Albani were not rulers of the entire Balkans, were not in present day Croatia, Bosnia, Serbia, or even Kosovo. They were for the most part where they are today.

At one time the Balkans were under the Roman empire all the way to Turkey and on up to England. They were all called Romans, but they all had their clans, tribes, or ethnicity. Much like Asian and European is a general term today, Illyrian was a general term back then. Albanians are not descendants from every Illyrian, nor do they hold claim to all the lands they keep saying they do...sadly they use the Illyrian excuse for it, yet are clueless to the truth.

If only Albania was located a bit more east than we could claim them to be Arabic, or maybe a bit more south and then we could say they are African. But since they lie so close to central europe well they must be allians...

This is pathetic, I cant believe people are so delusional not willing to accept that they are all the same people. If you just look at the indo european language family tree you will find that Albanian was one of the original languages and it did not branch off something else.

Not claiming this as proof but here are some quich Albanian-English lessons:
liroje (Redeem)
I liria (The freedom)
I lire (The fee)

My personal opinion on this is that after 500 years of ottoman occupation, Serbs Albanians and Greeks have more genes in common with the Turks than their ancient descendants they pretend to be from and all this discussion is kind of pointless.
(jinx, 14 November 2014 18:29)

As I said in my previous posting no serious historian would ever claim that modern peoples are direct descendants of ancient peoples, at least in terms of DNA but let me clarify a couple of points in your posting.Firstly,Greece wasn't 500 years under the Ottomans as you suggest.South of Greece and the Islands were under the Venetians until the middle of 15th century.Secondly,Greece declared its independence in 1822 whereas most of the Balkans gained theirs many years later.Finally,your assertion about common genes with the Turks is disputed by the world ancestry map.

http://admixturemap.paintmychromosomes.com/

you need to read some history books on the ottoman empire, not those written by serb or greek or albanian scholars.

This what I did.If you did read one of my postings below I did quote the work carried out by Turkish historians which of course are not popular with Albanians because their narrative is completely opposite to the Albanian one. Talip Kucukcan (Re-claiming identity:Ethnicity,religion& Turkish Muslims)argues that during Beyazid II rule (1481-15120 the Ottoman Turks changed the demographic structure in the Balkans.Thousands of Turkish nomads were brought and settled in the occupied areas.

If anything your DNA link shows that the balkan people have more in common with turks than any other nation

I am not sure you've read the same map because the one below shows there is no connection with the Turks or Albanians.If you click on Italy you'll find many similarities between Italians and Greeks.

Is your personal life such a failure that you are trying to claim some of the glory of the past?

My personal life is fulfilled both culturally and materially and I have never claimed ancestry from Zeus or anybody else-unlike the Albanian crowd which never fail to remind us of their fake Illyrian ancestry.

Someone who exposes your ignorance and lies is not necessarily racist.

boom,

Obviously, you have no idea what you are talking about: you mix up Food, drinks, DNA and you produce an (un-)historical cocktail which you call heritage.Heritage is always understood or defined as tangible and intangible and by tangible I mean historic buildings which were passed down from previous generations and are worth preserving whereas intangible heritage practices are defined such as language, culture, popular song,religion, literature or dress.None of these heritage practices is connected with Turkey in any shape or form.

Your assertion again that popular food (if you can give it this description) such as Kebab or Raki drink is Turkish is totally wrong.Kebab did originate from Persia and expanded into Middle Eastern countries whereas the Cretans in Greece have been producing Raki or Tsikoudia(Greek) when the Turks were still in Mongolia.Your next sweeping statement that Greek cuisine is Turkish is utter rubbish.You must've heard for "Mediterranean Diet" rich in fish and green and has been around for thousands of years.If you also look at a Greek food bible you'll see a substantial number of pork dishes.Are they Turkish?As to your other sweeping statement that all Balkan people look the same is laughable.I don't deny there was a degree of mingling between Christian Orthodox people but certainly not with Muslims.Do you know what "apostasy" means in Christian Orthodox?

it seems common sense to me to assume that a lot of people in the Balkans today would have some Turkish DNA in them, unless people honestly believe that 500 years of Ottoman rule leaves no imprint at all, in which case they're just lying to themselves
(Nikolle,

There is no need to believe anything or assume anything, Nikolle.In addition to the link of the genetic map that I’ve posted below there is also an official genetic map of Europe which is the product of EU research. It shows Greece to be the most genetically diverse country in Europe but still the biggest part of the population is descended from the ancient people, who were also of mixed stock.There were also large numbers of Greeks returning to Greece in Roman and medieval times so the population was getting replenished regularly. You can read about this on Eupedia. But as I've said before no contemporary historian will use DNA results to determine links between modern people and ancients.

Now we just have to prove that those nomads were albanians.

Who said they were Albanians.You asked me to read Ottoman history and when I come with a link -i can send you a few more- you complain.Personally I couldn't careless whether the Albanians originated from the Illyrians or the Daleks.

Why, we as a nation are so obsessed with the origin of Albanians?

Who is we? You may be obsessed I am not.

Why are we so bothered by the fact that albanians were natives to the balkans as they claim to be?

Well the Albanians use the argument in order to create precedence over their neighbours to achieve more land grab.It's not an accident that past and present Albanian prime ministers have been shouting from the top of the roof great albania.

This is the question you should ask yourself instead of your historical gibberish.

My historical "gibberish" is based on work carried out by Turkish historians -amongst others-who derived statistics and all other relevant information from Ottoman archives.I am not forcing you to accept it.

do you know why that is boom, because the Balkans are still dealing with their own nationalism, which has the anti-Ottoman narrative at its base. Ultimately, people in the Balkans have built their own myths which they now find it hard to snap out of. I wonder how many would accept that actually a lot of Balkan rulers invited the Ottomans over. a lot of them even gladly served for them. of course, the first one to make a deal with the Empire was a Greek Byzantine ruler by the name of Cantacuzenus, this I find bothers a lot of Greeks today, for reasons which I honestly can't get my head round. those were difference times when people lived by different ideas. it seems common sense to me to assume that a lot of people in the Balkans today would have some Turkish DNA in them, unless people honestly believe that 500 years of Ottoman rule leaves no imprint at all, in which case they're just lying to themselves

@Leonidas
you need to read some history books on the ottoman empire, not those written by serb or greek or albanian scholars. If anything your DNA link shows that the balkan people have more in common with turks than any other nation, I dont know what you want to achieve.
Is your personal life such a failure that you are trying to claim some of the glory of the past for yourself by saying that you are the son of Zeus by blood? Get a life and do smth yourself instead of indulging in useless racist crap.

@Leonidas
I always found it amusing how little we talk about our turkish heritage in Serbia, it is as hundred of years of occupation never happened.
With the exception of the church and languages that managed to survive, evth else in the balkans is mainly turkish in heritage.
Look, our favorite foods are kebab, sarma, burek and we drink rakija. They are all turkish foods and drinks.
Most greek kitchen is really turkish also. And it is impossible to distinguish a greek from a turk or serb or albanian in general. All this denial is beacuse deep in side we think we are a superior nation which is a racist trait and has brought so much suffering on our people.
How is possible that people of all races can co-habit in Western Europe, yet we balkan people, so similar, with so much common heritage, hate each other so much and commit some of the worst savageries in modern times?

@Leonidas
....Thousands of Turkish nomads were brought and settled in the occupied areas...
Now we just have to prove that those nomads were albanians and finally the mystery is solved, we finally know where the bastards come from.
Why dont you write a research paper on the origin of albanians while you are at it. Sesejl can certainly make use of it.
Why, we as a nation are so obsessed with the origin of Albanians?
Why are we so bothered by the fact that albanians were natives to the balkans as they claim to be?
If we prove that they somehow arrived here in 15th century, does that give us a historical right to ethnically cleanse them and commit state organised murder, rape and genocide in the 21st century?
If we claim to be the god chosen heavenly people, with thousand of years of civilization and history, why did we fall in total savagery only 20 years ago?
Are we really better than Albanians , Croats or Bosnians?
This is the question you should ask yourself instead of your historical gibberish.