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Albania
Albanians in Kosovo
Large numbers of ethnic Albanians lived outside the country,
in Italy, Greece, Turkey, the United States, and especially in
Yugoslavia or its former republics. Estimates based on Yugoslav
census data indicated that the number of Albanians in Yugoslavia
in 1981 totaled more than 1.7 million, or almost 8 percent of
the country's total population, of which about 70 percent resided
in Kosovo, a province of Serbia, 20 percent in Macedonia, and
9 percent in Montenegro. The predominantly Albanian Kosovo had
the highest birthrate in Europe and one of the highest in the
world: 29.9 per 1,000 in 1987. Persons under twenty-seven years
old accounted for 60 percent of Kosovo's total population, and
students--a reservoir of political ferment--over 30 percent. In
1981 only 12 percent of the Albanian population in Kosovo was
employed.
Student protests over living conditions in early 1981 led to
bloody riots throughout Kosovo, which accelerated the exodus of
Serbs and Montenegrins. The number of departures totalled 60,000
between 1981 and 1991. Haunted by the specter of secession, the
Serbian government resorted to repressive measures, culminating
in the revocation of Kosovo's autonomous status in July 1990.
Hundreds of Albanian activists were tried and imprisoned, and
a campaign was launched to entice Serbs to settle in Kosovo. Serbian
authorities suspended publication of the Albanianlanguage daily
Rilindja, alleging that it had become a "mouthpiece" of Albanian
nationalists. Thousands of students and parents protested the
introduction of a Serbian-language standard curriculum for all
middle and secondary schools. As a result of the curriculum's
implementation, many Albanian-language schools had to be closed.
At Kosovo's University of Pristina, student placements were reserved,
in disproportion to the population, for ethnic Serbs and Montenegrins--many
from outside Kosovo. (Even though a number of these reserved places
were not filled in the fall of 1990, Albanian applicants were
denied admission to the university.) Discrimination against Albanians
seeking employment or housing was rampant.
Data as of April 1992
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