Korçë is the eighth most populous city of the Republic of Albania and the seat of Korçë County and Korçë Municipality. The total population is 75,994, in a total area of 806 km2 (311 sq mi). It stands on a plateau some 850 m (2,789 ft) above sea level, surrounded by the Morava Mountains.
The postal history of Northern Epirus, a region in the western Balkans, in southern modern Albania, comprises two periods; 1912–1916 and 1940-41. Northern Epirus was under Greek administration during the First Balkan War (1912–1913), but it was then awarded to the newly founded Albanian state by the Florence Protocol (1913). During this period, Greek stamps were used. Greece withdrew from the region in early 1914. The people of Epirus were unwilling to be part of Albania, though, and launched a revolution. Under a provisional government, the independent Northern Epirus was formed in February 1914 and it eventually managed to gain full autonomy under nominal Albanian sovereignty, according to the Protocol of Corfu. Northern Epirus operated its own postal service and issued postage stamps, both official and unofficial, during that year.
The Vlora War was a military conflict between Albanian nationalists and Italy throughout the Vlora region of Albania and Albanian nationalists, who were divided into small groups of fighters. The war lasted three months until an armistice, according to which Italy gave up plans to turn Albania into a mandate and relinquished Vlöre; in exchange Italy retained a diplomatic protection over Albania to guarantee the country's independence and annexed the island of Saseno. This settlement was confirmed within the League of Nations by the Conference of Ambassadors a year later. The conflict had great impact in the struggle of Albania for the safeguard of its territories while Albanian borders and future were discussed in the Paris Peace Conference. The Vlora War is seen as a turning point in the establishment of Albanian independence.
The Balkans Theatre or Balkan Campaign was a theatre of World War I fought between the Central Powers and the Allies.
The Principality of Albania refers to the short-lived monarchy in Albania, headed by Wilhelm, Prince of Albania, that lasted from the Treaty of London of 1913 which ended the First Balkan War, through the invasions of Albania during World War I and the subsequent disputes over Albanian independence during the Paris Peace Conference of 1919, until 1925, when the monarchy was abolished and the Albanian Republic declared.
The Italian protectorate of Albania, also known as the Kingdom of Albania or Greater Albania, existed as a protectorate of the Kingdom of Italy. It was practically a union between Italy and Albania, officially led by Italy's King Victor Emmanuel III and its government: Albania was led by Italian governors, after being militarily occupied by Italy, from 1939 until 1943. During this time, Albania ceased to exist as an independent country and became an autonomous part of the Italian Empire. Officials intended to make Albania part of a Greater Italy by assimilating Albanians as Italians and colonizing Albania with Italian settlers from the Italian Peninsula to transform it gradually into an Italian land.
The Italian invasion of Albania was a brief military campaign which was launched by the Kingdom of Italy against the Albanian Kingdom in 1939. The conflict was a result of the imperialistic policies of the Italian prime minister and dictator Benito Mussolini. Albania was rapidly overrun, its ruler King Zog I went into exile in neighboring Greece, and the country was made a part of the Italian Empire as a protectorate in personal union with the Italian Crown.
The Autonomous Republic of Northern Epirus was a short-lived, self-governing entity founded in the aftermath of the Balkan Wars on 28 February 1914, by the local Greek population in southern Albania.
The Italian colonists in Albania were Italians who, between the two World Wars, moved to Albania to colonize the Balkan country for the Kingdom of Italy.
The Protocol of Corfu, signed on May 17, 1914, was an agreement between the representatives of the Albanian Government and the Provisional Government of Northern Epirus, which officially recognized the area of Northern Epirus as an autonomous self-governing region under the sovereignty of the prince of the newly established Principality of Albania. The agreement granted the Greeks of the districts of Korytsa and Argyrokastro, which form Northern Epirus, wider religious, educational, cultural and political autonomy, inside the borders of the Albanian state.
Independent Albania was proclaimed on 28 November 1912. This chapter of Albanian history was shrouded in controversy and conflict as the larger part of the self-proclaimed region had found itself controlled by the Balkan League states: Serbia, Montenegro and Greece from the time of the declaration until the period of recognition when Albania relinquished many of the lands originally included in the declared state. Since the proclamation of the state in November 1912, the Provisional Government of Albania asserted its control over a small part of central Albania including the important cities of Vlorë and Berat.
The Republic of Central Albania was a short-lived unrecognised state established on 16 October 1913, with its administrative centre in Durrës, today in Albania.
The Autonomous Province of Korçë, sometimes referred to as Republic of Korçë, was an autonomous legal entity established in 27/10 December 1916, by the local French forces after the city of Korçë fell under their control during World War I, and which lasted until 1920.
The Bulgarian occupation of Albania was anoccupation of the eastern parts of Albania by the Kingdom of Bulgaria's army during World War I. It lasted from December 10, 1915, when the Bulgarian army crossed the Drin river and entered Albania, until September 9, 1917, when French troops captured Pogradec from the Bulgarian army. After that the territory went back to Macedonia and Albania remained under occupation.
In World War I, Albania had been an independent state, having gained independence from the Ottoman Empire, on 28 November 1912, following the First Balkan War. It was recognised by the Great Powers as the Principality of Albania, after Turkey officially renounced all its rights in May 1913. Being a fledgling new country, it quickly unravelled and just a few months after taking power, its German ruler, Prince Wilhelm, was forced to flee. After World War I broke out, anarchy took hold of the country as tribes and regions rebelled against central rule. To protect the Greek minority, Greek control was established in the southern districts replacing the Northern Epirote units beginning in October 1914. In response to this, Italy, although officially neutral at the time, also sent troops into the port of Vlorë, while Serbia and Montenegro took control of northern regions. In 1915 Serbia was overrun by combined German, Austro-Hungarian, and Bulgarian forces; the Serbian army retreated across the mountain passes of northern Albania, towards the Adriatic. Italian troops drove the Greeks from southern Albania and brought almost all Albanian territory under their control. Austrian forces invaded in June 1916; Austro-Hungarian forces remained in Albania until the end of the war when a multinational Allied force broke through and pushed them out in 1918.
Themistokli Gërmenji was an Albanian nationalist figure and guerrilla fighter. One of the activists of the Albanian National Awakening and the leader of the Albanian irregulars from 1909 to 1914, he became the prefect of police of the Autonomous Albanian Republic of Korçë from 1916 until his execution due to a miscarriage of justice by a French military tribunal in 1917.
The Great Retreat, also known in Serbian historiography as the Albanian Golgotha, was a strategic withdrawal of the Royal Serbian Army, which marked the end of the second Serbian campaign of World War I.
Protocol of Kapshtica also known as Kapshtica Protocol, or Kapshtica Agreement, was an agreement between Albanian and Greek representatives signed in the border town of Kapshticë on 28 May 1920. Under this agreement both sides accepted the pre-World War I Greek-Albanian border status, as well as a number of provisions for the protection of the local Greek population of Korçë District and its educational and religious rights.
The Liberation of Serbia, Albania and Montenegro was a military action in the Balkans in the final weeks of World War I. Between 29 September and 11 November 1918, the Allied Army of the Orient liberated these three countries from occupation by the Central Powers.
Samarina Republic or Republic of the Pindus is a historiographic name for the attempt and proposal to create an Aromanian canton under the protection of Italy during World War I. A declaration of independence was issued on 29 August 1917 by some Aromanian figures at Samarina and other villages of the Pindus mountains of northern Greece during the short period of occupation by Italy of the area in July and August 1917. In the immediate withdrawal of Italians a few days later, Greek troops retook control of the region claimed by the canton without meeting any resistance.
