Great news from Croatia: Albanian-language high school will open in Osijek

Many Albanian - language elementary schools operate in the town of Osijek and its district. There are these educational sites in which the cultural and national identity of the children of our countrymen living and working there.

But soon in this town, featuring the centre of Baranj-Osijek Prefecture, the Albanian High School, which will be the second such school in Croatia, is expected to open after the Albanian High School in Zara. It's this good news for thousands of Albanians living in both Osijek and the Baranja Prefecture, the Albanian language educator in this Prefecture, Mendu Imer.

The Albanian community is among the highly respected and officially accepted communities in Croatia. This respect is the result of the sacrifice Albanians have made in the struggle to protect Croatia from the aggression of the Yugoslav and Serbian armies in the early 1990s.

One of the many Albanians who joined the Croatian fight against Serbian aggression has been General Esat Colak, the Croatian Army's military superior and general in the Kosovo Liberation Army. Currently, he is chairman of the Albanian Community in Croatia.

Croatia's Albanians are politically represented on two steps of local government, but also in the Croatian Parliament, through MP Ermina Lekaj-Pernaskaj. Over 30,000 Albanians live in Croatia, but the real number is about 400,000 because some of them are declared Bosniaks or Croats.

The Albanian community in this country has started intensive activities so that these Albanians -- considered to be 7 thousand -- can again be registered as before and officially return to the national trunk. /Gazzeta News