Albanian researcher Jonila Godole says that decommunization in Albania is a “long and painful process”. She said that a substantial process has taken off 30 years.

Godole said that “justice” for victims of communisms began with a financial lawsuit, spread to crimes against humanity, and sealed as genocide while by the end of 1991 all sentences were zeroed.

“We started the decommunization process for the sake of democracy because Albania is a unique country that in July 1996 had more than 35 convicts by senior officials of the communist dome,” said Godole.

From 1998 to 2005 the entire process stalled, starting from compensations for crimes during communism, and then resumed after DP took back power.

“This process of transitional justice was not accompanied by wider decommunization. We did not deal with the mentality and the great damage that 45 years of communism had caused to the way how society thinks”, she said.

Jonila Godole said that decommunization over the years has been used by politics to do “witch hunts”.