President Ilir Meta has criticized Serbia for implementing policies that result in the depopulation of areas inhabited by ethnic Albanians.
On Monday, Meta awarded Muharrem Salihu, an Albanian from Medvedje in Serbia, with a presidential award for his work in support of ethnic Albanians in Serbia.
“For years he has been struggling to stop a problematic process, that of our disintegration as a nation, in the extreme borders of our existence as Albanians, borders that have been constantly blurred in the last two centuries. It is the so-called address passivation process,” Meta stated.
The process relates to policies by Serbian government to erase ethnic Albanians from the Civil Registry in the Presevo Valley if they are not found to be living in their last address. The three municipalities of Presevo, Medvedje and Bujanoc located in the valley are home to ethnic Albanians.
Meta praised Salihu’s struggle to inform Albania, Kosovo, US and EU institutions about the issue.
“I understood [through Saliku] why Serbia intends to depopulate Medvedje in a dishonest game of unequal territorial corrections,” Meta said.
Kosovo’s Speaker of Parliament Vjosa Osmani also raised the alarm this year about the same issue.
Read more: Serbia Is Depopulating Presevo Valley from Albanians at Alarming Levels
