At the end of the First World War with the departure of the Austro-Hungarian forces in October-November 1918, Kosovo and other territories inhabited by Albanians, which the London Conference of 1913 had given to Serbia and Montenegro, were reoccupied by the army Serbian.
The hopes of the Albanians that the end of the war and the peace agreements would correct the unjust decisions of the powers were in vain, Armend Mehmeti writes in today's issue of Koha Ditore.
The Great Powers not only recognized Serbia's sovereignty over these countries, but they, starting from the Secret Treaty of London of 1915, intended to further dismember Albania in 1913 by offering Albanian territories to Italy, Greece and Serbia.
In this way, the Albanians of Kosovo and other Albanian countries after the First World War remained under Serbian rule, now under the new name of the Serbian-Croatian-Slovenian Kingdom, proclaimed on December 1, 1918 after the union of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes in a common state.
But, despite the creation of a new kingdom, which claimed to be a modern state of the time, the negative attitude towards the Albanians did not change at all. The same Serbian policy of persecution and expulsion of Albanians from their villages continued. In fact, the SKS Kingdom did not even consider Albanians as an ethnic minority, even though it had signed the Saint Germain Treaty on minorities on September 10, 1919, in particular, Article 2 stated: "the Serbian-Croatian-Slovenian state is obliged to give all its inhabitants "provide full and general protection of life and liberty regardless of origin, language, ethnicity, race or religious belief", and article 7: "no restrictions shall apply to the use of any language by any citizen of the Serbian state Croatian-Slovenian whether in private or commercial relations, religion or the press and public meetings", which were directly related to the Albanians. (You can read the full article in today's issue of Koha Ditore)
