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How would Europe look today without Albania?
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- It is unfortunate that Albania's altruism is often misread and misunderstood.
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By Lutfi Dervishi
In a continent teetering on the brink of demographic catastrophe, Albania, which is often bearing more weight than its knees can handle—a burden that should have been carried by the great powers—is emerging as a humanitarian superpower.
While the EU has been grappling for decades with an aging population and a shortage of labor, Albania has taken on the Herculean task of single-handedly saving the union.
Germany, the country often dubbed the economic engine of Europe, is facing a labor force deficit and a surplus of pensioners. But Albania’s intervention, generously sending its best and brightest to manage production lines, hospitals, and nursing homes in Western Europe, is reviving lost hope.
This self-sacrificial act cannot be underestimated; by emptying its hospitals, schools, villages, and cities, Albania is ensuring that the elderly in Frankfurt receive their daily dose of care. After all, what value do some abandoned villages and towns in Albania have in the face of the needs of its strategic ally and great friend Germany for builders, drivers, nurses, doctors, etc.?
And let us not forget Italy, the country of pizza, pasta, Serie A, Sanremo, and, more recently, unemployment and migration crises. Albania, which has always felt indebted to the great powers, and especially to Italy, has decided to relieve its neighbor in distress of its headaches.
Instead of Italy, abandoned by other Union countries, facing asylum seekers alone, Albania has stepped up to the task by generously opening the doors of Shëngjin, a tourist town, transforming it into a five-star refugee camp.
It’s a self-offered solution where everyone comes out a winner—Italy maintains its reputation as an untouched tourist paradise, the EU learns how to solve the migrant problem, and Albania gains the exotic taste of multiculturalism, which it so desperately needs.
But Tirana’s contributions don’t end there. As the world becomes increasingly interconnected and globalization reaches its zenith, Albania has turned its gaze eastward. Once, the last communist leader said that we are neither East nor West. Today, we are a bridge, even more than a bridge, between East and West.
The annual conference of ambassadors currently being held in Tirana has seized the bull by the horns. Well aware that Indonesia, Thailand, and the Philippines are facing high youth unemployment, Albanian diplomacy has intervened to offer its labor market as a lifeline. It’s a revolutionary concept: exchange head-for-head Albania’s departing youth for the untapped energy of Southeast Asia. After all, who needs local talent when everything (like many things in the land of eagles) can be imported? While young Albanians head to the UK to serve coffee and clean hotel rooms, the youth of Jakarta and Manila come to Tirana to do the same. Quid pro quo. Head for head!
It is unfortunate that Albania’s altruism is often misread and misunderstood. The International Organization for Migration (IOM) recently published a shocking report: Albania and Moldova are the most prone to emigration in Europe. With 40% of Albania’s workforce now working abroad, many might think the country is on the brink of collapse. But this pessimism misses the point. The classic case of something you see, but it is not as you see it. Albania is not suffering; it is self-sacrificing for the good of the continent and the globe.
Let’s imagine, for a moment, a world without Albania’s generosity. The pubs in the UK would be empty, the elderly in Germany would be left without care, and Milan’s construction sites would stand desolate. The youth of Southeast Asia would remain in their countries, dreaming of a better life that only Albania could offer. The refugee camps of Shëngjin would remain deserted. This is how the EU and the world would look if a nation like Albania withdrew from its global responsibilities.
Albania’s leader, of course, knows well what global responsibility means. He understands that to save Europe, to save the world, sacrifices must be made. And so, with determination, we continue to empty our hospitals, schools, homes, villages, and cities by sending hundreds of thousands of Albanians to fight the economic crisis and demographic decline of the EU. On the other hand, we invite the unemployed of Asia, offering them opportunities they had never even dreamed of before.
In this noble mission, Albania has become the cornerstone of global stability, at a time when the world and especially the great powers have lost their way, caught up with the wars in Ukraine and Gaza.
So, the next time you read articles like the one based on IOM information about Albania’s high emigration or INSTAT statistics on population decline, don’t make the mistake of mentioning or thinking of the word crisis. It’s not a crisis; it’s a contribution. And it doesn’t really matter if the world recognizes this contribution. What matters is that yesterday we sacrificed for the global proletarian revolution, and today for the victories of regional, continental, and global capitalism!
