The well-known journalist: Greece has invested in the Beleri figure, it sees it as a symbol of the Hellenization of Himara

The arrest of Fredi Beler, the elected mayor of Himara, is the last chapter of a story that repeats itself in the relations between Albania and Greece.

Our neighbor has not hesitated this time to turn an internal issue of Albania into a cause for the political rights of the minority. Even more, to raise it to the high levels of the European Union, where Albania intends to integrate.

"Greece has invested in the figure of Fredi Beleri, regardless of his light-shadows, he is a figure known in Greece as a symbol of what is seen as the defense of Hellenism in Himara", said the journalist, Artur Bibe.

A name with a dubious past, accused and convicted for the desecration of Albanian symbols, even worse, investigated as being involved in the Peshkopia Massacre. A local elected official who is suspected and investigated for vote buying, for which Greece lobbies and approves with 290 votes in the European Parliament a resolution.

A political act that surprisingly seeks to go beyond the decisions of the courts demanding the release of a person arrested as a suspect of electoral crime.

"It is underlined that this issue is related to the general respect of fundamental rights, the unresolved issue of the properties of the members of the Greek ethnic minority in the area of ??the municipality and the accusations of encroachment by the state in the justification of the decision to approve the changes", adds the journalist.

That vote was compromised when it was revealed that the initiator, no less, was a Greek politician named Thanasis Bakolas, once an adviser to Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotaqis.

We must not forget that keeping Fredi Beler behind bars is a unanimous decision of all levels of the judiciary based on the evidence collected. In the May 2023 elections, 5 people were arrested in Greece for buying votes and kept behind bars. The policy of the neighboring state, in that case, was not concerned about the principle of presumption of innocence, drawing the double standard in the Beleri case.