Peshkopi is a town located in the mountainous regions of northeastern Albania, in Dibër County. It is the capital of both the county and the district of Dibër, and is the only county regional capital in Albania which does not share its name with its county. The population at the 2011 census was 13,251.
Debar (Macedonian: Дебaр ; Albanian: Dibër, Albanian definite form: Dibra or Dibra e Madhe is a city in the western part of North Macedonia, near the border with Albania, off the road from Struga to Gostivar. It is the seat of Debar Municipality. Debar has an ethnic Albanian majority of 74% and is North Macedonia's only city where ethnic Macedonians do not rank first or second demographically. The official languages are Macedonian and Albanian.
Spiro Theodori Moisiu, born as Spiro Koxhobashi, was the Major general of the Albanian National Liberation Army during World War II. He was the father of the former President of Albania, Alfred Moisiu.
The Italian governorate of Montenegro existed from October 1941 to September 1943 as an occupied territory under military government of Fascist Italy during World War II. Although the Italians had intended to establish a quasi-independent Montenegrin kingdom, these plans were permanently shelved after a popular uprising in July 1941. Following the Italian surrender in September 1943, the territory of Montenegro was occupied by German forces which withdrew in December 1944.
Mustafa Merlika-Kruja was one of the signatories of the Albanian Declaration of Independence. He was Prime Minister of Albania during the Italian occupation from December 4, 1941, to January 19, 1943.
Konstantin "Kosta" Milovanović Pećanac was a Serbian and Yugoslav Chetnik commander (vojvoda) during the Balkan Wars, World War I and World War II. Pećanac fought on the Serbian side in both Balkan Wars and World War I, joining the forces of Kosta Vojinović during the Toplica uprising of 1917. Between the wars he was an important leader of Chetnik veteran associations, and was known for his strong hostility to the Yugoslav Communist Party, which made him popular in conservative circles. As president of the Chetnik Association during the 1930s, he transformed it into an aggressively partisan Serb political organisation with over half a million members. During World War II, Pećanac collaborated with both the German military administration and their puppet government in the German-occupied territory of Serbia.
Azem Bejta, commonly known as Azem Galica, was an Albanian nationalist, resistance fighter and rebel who fought for the unification of Kosovo with Albania. He is known for leading the Kachak Movement against the Kingdom of Yugoslavia.
Elez Koci was a prominent Albanian independence activist from the region of Dibër, Albania. He was born on 1856, in Ostren i Madh, Dibër, in the present-day municipality of Bulqizë. He attended elementary studies in Debar and in 1876 finished the theological high school in Monastir.
Pavle Đurišić was a Montenegrin Serb regular officer of the Royal Yugoslav Army who became a Chetnik commander (vojvoda) and led a significant proportion of the Chetniks in Montenegro during World War II. He distinguished himself and became one of the main commanders during the popular uprising against the Italians in Montenegro in July 1941, but later collaborated with the Italians in actions against the Communist-led Yugoslav Partisans. In 1943, his troops carried out several massacres against the Muslim population of Bosnia, Herzegovina, and the Sandžak in which an estimated 10,000 people were killed between January and March, including thousands of women, children, and the elderly. He then led his troops during their participation in the anti-Partisan Case White offensive alongside Italian forces. Đurišić was captured by the Germans in May 1943, escaped, and was recaptured.
Abaz Kupi or Abas Kupi. He was also known as Bazi i Canës. He was an Albanian military officer.
The Committee for the National Defence of Kosovo was an Albanian organization founded in Shkodër on 1 May 1918. It mainly consisted of the political exiles from Kosovo and was led by Hoxha Kadri from Pristina. It had existed in looser form since May 1915.
Riza Cerova (1896–1935) was an Albanian political figure of the early 20th century. He is mostly known for his role during June Revolution of 1924 and Fier uprising of 1935.
The Uprising in Serbia was initiated in July 1941 by the Communist Party of Yugoslavia against the German occupation forces and their Serbian quisling auxiliaries in the Territory of the Military Commander in Serbia. At first the Yugoslav Partisans mounted diversions and sabotage and attacked representatives of Milan Aćimović's quisling administration. In late August some Chetniks joined the uprising and liberated Loznica. The uprising soon reached mass proportions. Partisans and Chetniks captured towns that weak German garrisons had abandoned. The armed uprising soon engulfed great parts of the occupied territory. The largest liberated territory in occupied Europe was created by the Partisans in western Serbia, and was known as the Republic of Užice. Rebels shared power on the liberated territory; the center of the Partisan liberated territory was in Užice, and Chetniks had their headquarters in Ravna Gora.
Prenk Pervizi was an Albanian military figure, General of the Albanian army, who also served as Minister of Defence for a short period during World War II. Pervizi attended the Military Academy in Vienna, Austria, from 1914 to 1918, and later in Torino, 1930–1933. As a military figure, he was a protagonist in the foreground of Albanian history in the years between 1918 and 1944. Friend and right-hand man of King Zog, he remained loyal from the beginning to the end to him and the Albanian Kingdom, 1928–1939. During World War II he was involved in military operations. Recruited by the Italians and sent to the first line of combat, he came into conflict with them, withdrawing the Albanian troops from the Greco-Italian War. He also opposed the German SS troops recruitment process in Albania. Bitter opponent of the communists, after failed attempts to engage some serious support from the British emissaries, he was forced to exile, first in Greece and later in Belgium as a political refugee. He spent the rest of his life in Belgium, where he died at age 80, on 6 September 1977.
The Battle of Lumë, also referred by the Albanians as the Uprising of Lumë, was a series of clashes between the Albanian locals of the region of Lumë in Ottoman Albania against the invading Serbian army in 1912 during the First Balkan War period. As the Kingdom of Serbia sought to gain access to the Adriatic Sea, the Serbian army met significant resistance from Albanian militia in the Luma region, resulting in the defeat of the Serbian forces. In securing the central Adriatic coast in Albania, Albanian political figureheads were able to disembark in Durrës and proceed with their plans for the eventual Albanian Declaration of Independence.
Operation Fenix was an operation launched by militants of the KLA's "cobra" unit, which conducted two ambushes out of Albanian territory near the border outpost of Koshare on Yugoslav forces. Six Yugoslav Army personnel were killed. The KLA suffered no casualties, and captured Yugoslav ammunition, equipment and looted the dead soldiers.
The Kachak Movement was a series of Albanian uprisings in Albanian-populated territories in Kosovo, Macedonia and Sanxhak from 1919 to 1927. The uprisings began after the end of the First World War when Kosovo became part of the new Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes. Parts of the Albanian population which resisted Yugoslav rule formed the Kachak guerrilla movement under the leadership of the Committee for the National Defence of Kosovo and conducted military operations and guerrilla-style attacks against Yugoslav soldiers and administrative establishments.
The June Revolution also known as the Antibourgeois Democratic Revolution was a revolt backed by the parliamentary opposition to the Zog I government, following the 1923 Albanian parliamentary election.
Ismail Strazimiri was an Albanian revolutionary, military and educational activist from Upper Reka.
The War in Dibra, also known as the Dibra Uprising, was an armed conflict which occurred from July to September 1920 in the Dibra region, located in what is now northern Albania and southern North Macedonia. The uprising took place in the turbulent period following the end of World War I and was part of the broader resistance of Albanians against the territorial claims and military incursions by the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes into Albanian lands.
Military Merit Cross