University of Tirana rector Mynyr Koni and the Forum for Academic Freedoms, an organization of faculty members, have condemned the violence of the police forced used against students occupying the university building in protest against the government’s education policies.
Thursday night, large numbers of police forces entered several occupied faculty buildings and tried to evict the students, barricaded inside, with physical force.
On Friday, Rector Koni wrote in a Facebook post:
Considering the events that happened today in the Faculty of Economics and Faculty of Law, as Rector of the University of Tirana but also as teacher for many years, I express my deep personal indignation about the completely irresponsible actions of several members of the police forces inside the premises of the Faculty of Economy.
The students of the University of Tirana are in their legitimate right to protest as free citizens of a democratic country, to demand the fulfillment of their request for quality and modern education!
The Forum for Academic Freedoms called for solidarity with the protesting students, which again spent last night hauled up in the faculty building, enduring the pressure and threats of the private security firms hired by the university.
The Forum for Academic Freedoms is following with concern the violence and pressure that is exerted on the students by the police forces in collaboration with the administrators that play the role of political commissaries, as sanctioned by the Higher Education Law.
Yesterday and today, many police forces, in open violation of the law, have entered the premises of the university, openly attacking students which exercise their constitutional right to protest […].
We announce that if these acts of violence and pressure against the students aren’t stopped and those who exercised this violence aren’t prosecuted, we teachers will call for a general strike among the faculty in protection of our students.
