EU Ambassador Vlahutin's speech for "Missing Persons during the Communist Era in Albania"

Excellences, Ladies and Gentlemen, relatives of missing persons,

For me this is a very important day which will give a new hope for healing the pain of many Albanians who lost their loved ones to the brutality of the Communist regime. Their loved ones who were imprisoned, tortured, humiliated and killed only because they wanted to live, in dignity, as free people, with dignity, in a democratic country.

Families, but also the entire society, and especially the young people need to know the truth, because without the truth there is no justice. Families have the right to ensure proper burial to to their loved ones, and find a possibility to pay respect to those who have sacrificed their lives so that Albania would become a true democracy.

For the sake of justice, the European Union in Albania allocated 600 000 euros for a pilot project aiming at DNA identification of victims in two mass graves in the locations of Dajti and Balsh.

This project is implemented by the Commission for Missing persons and in collaboration with the Albanian Institutions and I want to thank all who helped so that today we could have the agreement signed, so that the work on the sites can start immediately.

The project also should assist in strengthening the capacity of Albanian institutions, namely the Institute of the Formerly Politically Persecuted, the Institute of Forensic Medicine and the Prosecutor’s Office so that institutions can launch a full-scale process of exhumation and identification of missing persons from the Communist era in Albania.

This is a very important task. It is important for all the victims of that brutal regime, and it is important for the society as whole.

It will also require a lot of courage, courage to tell the truth, courage to forgive and courage to find peace.

Albanians have suffered enough. They suffered terribly from their own. It is time to stop this once and forever.

There is a saying "the law starts where the love stops". This effort to locate and identify the victims of communism is the work of both love and law.

It is a work of both love and law and deepest respect for those who gave the most precious gift of their own life for the freedom of all.  But it is at the same time an important message for Albania, so that the justice can be done finally.