DASH Report on Religious Freedom / Albania and Kosovo with Inherited Problems

The report analyzes in separate chapters the situation of freedom of religion in Albania and Kosovo.

Albania

The report reiterates that the Albanian constitution guarantees freedom of religion. It states that there is no official religion, says the state is neutral in matters of faith, recognizes the equality and independence of religious groups, and prohibits discrimination on religious grounds.

The government has agreements with the Albanian Muslim Community, the Bektashi Muslim Community, the Catholic Church, the Albanian Autocephalous Orthodox Church and the Evangelical Brotherhood of Albania. These agreements recognize these groups as the country’s major religious communities and address property restitution and other arrangements.

The government, the report said, legalized 62 buildings owned by religious groups during 2021, which were built without building permits, compared to 92 that were legalized in 2020. While 25 other properties remained under consideration.

The five religious communities, which have agreements with the government, continued to express concerns about the return of property confiscated during the communist regime, stating that corruption, lack of government knowledge of competencies and jurisdiction over property issues, and heavy workloads in the system judicial, prevented the fulfillment of their claims.

The State Cadastre Agency, which in 2020 created an official register to show the amount, value and ownership of real estate, reported challenges in the process of restoring properties used by other parties, providing compensation with other properties, or by paying compensation in cash.

Evangelical Brotherhood leaders reported continuing difficulties in obtaining permission to build places of worship. The Bektashi community and the Muslim community again reported problems in protecting their property rights.

The five main religious communities continued to ask the government for exemption from certain state taxes, under bilateral agreements. Although they supported government measures to prevent COVID-19, religious leaders complained that the government had not responded to their requests for financial assistance to cope with the impact of the pandemic, and that restrictions on public gatherings prevented the meeting. of funds.

In September, the government and the Albanian-American Development Fund opened the tender process for the construction of a museum in Vlora, dedicated to the country’s efforts to protect Jews during World War II.

The report mentions that in April, a man attacked worshipers at a mosque in Tirana, injuring five people. Prosecutors demanded that the attacker, converted to Islam, be hospitalized due to a history of mental illness.

According to a report by the International Republican Institute (IRI), most of the media in the country that referred to Jews focused on the memory of the Holocaust and the country’s good relations with Israel, although there were some articles that spread conspiracy theories about Jews.

The US embassy, ​​the report said, called on government officials to speed up the handling of property claims and return buildings and other properties confiscated during the communist era to religious groups. Embassy officials met with representatives of religious communities to discuss interfaith and governmental relations, challenges related to legalization and restitution of property, and financial challenges posed by restrictions due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Embassy-supported programs, including youth programs, focused on developing community inclusion, promoting the empowerment of women in religious communities, and emphasizing the compatibility of religious belief and democracy.

The US government estimates that of the 3.1 million people in Albania, according to the 2011 census, Sunni Muslims make up 57 percent of the population, Catholics 10 percent, Orthodox about 7 percent and Bektashis 2 percent. About 20 percent refused to answer about their religious affiliation.

Public schools are secular, the report said, while private schools could offer religious instruction. Religious communities run 113 educational institutions including universities, primary and secondary schools, preschools, kindergartens, vocational and orphanage schools.

Chuang

In the chapter on Kosovo, the report states that the constitution prohibits religious discrimination and ensures freedom of religion, but warns that the law does not allow religious groups to be registered as legal entities. A bill designed to give them such status, introduced in parliament in 2020, remained pending.

The Islamic Community of Kosovo said some schools continued to implement a Ministry of Education directive banning religious dress, denying access to school to students wearing headscarves.

The report notes that in September, the Kosovo Constitutional Court notified the state prosecutor of the government’s continued refusal to implement the 2016 court ruling recognizing the Serbian Orthodox Church as owning about 24 hectares of land around the Decani Monastery. In response to the government’s continued non-implementation of both that decision and a 2020 road works agreement within the Deçan Monastery Special Protected Area, the Serbian Orthodox Church cut off official communication with the government in May.

In October, media reported that authorities were investigating a Christian Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) following complaints that the organization published pictures of children along with religious content without parental permission. The media reported that the NGO denied violating the laws.

In August, the Islamic Community of Kosovo and the media reported that police arrested author Gjin Morena on charges of publishing poems that incite intolerance towards Muslims. Morena later pleaded guilty and was fined.

Representatives of the Kosovo Protestant Evangelical Church said that the lack of institutional support to provide a cemetery for its faithful is preventing them from performing funeral services according to their faith.

According to the Serbian Orthodox Church, in June, police, without explanation, ordered a Serbian pilgrim bus to return to Serbia. In April, the pan-European federation of cultural heritage civil society organizations, Europa Nostra, included the Decani Monastery in its list of the seven most endangered heritage sites in Europe, a definition that government officials said was “one-sided” and incorrect”.

The report notes that in June, a Montenegrin citizen chanted “Kill Albanians” during a rally on St. Vito Day in Gazimestan near Pristina. A Pristina court fined him instead of imprisonment and barred him from entering the country for five years.

The Islamic Community said media reports continued to portray its community negatively, contributing to a climate of intolerance and discrimination. Representatives of this community, as well as the Protestant Evangelical Church, said that some of their followers were reluctant to practice their faith openly for fear of discrimination.

DASH cites Kosovo police reports of 87 incidents during the year, up from 57 a year earlier.

The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe reported that it continues to support the improvement of relations between religious communities and municipalities.

US embassy officials continued to encourage the government to pass laws allowing religious groups to gain legal status, enforce mechanisms to protect freedom of religion, enforce legislation and court rulings on Serbian Orthodox religious sites, and resolve disputes. property with this church.

The US government estimates that of Kosovo’s 1.9 million inhabitants, 95.6 percent are Muslim, 2.2 percent are Catholic, and 1.4 percent are Orthodox. The law does not define a formal religion, but lists five “traditional” religious communities that receive additional protections and benefits, including tax cuts.

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