The National Museum of Secret Surveillance “House of Leaves” in Tirana, Albania commemorated the biologist and renowned Albanian scientist, Sabiha Kasimati (September 15, 1912 – February 26, 1951).
Sabiha Kasimati was born on September 15, 1912, in the city of Edirne, Turkey. With her family’s return to Albania, she attended the French Lyceum in Korçë, and due to her excellent results, she was awarded a scholarship by the state to the University of Turin, Faculty of Biological Sciences. Sabiha Kasimati completed her doctoral studies in 1941 with outstanding results in ichthyology. That same year, she returned to Albania to contribute to science and education.
In 1943, she was appointed as a scientific employee in the first academic institution called the Royal Institute of Albanian Studies. However, due to health problems, she went to Italy for treatment, from where she returned in 1945. With the establishment of the dictatorship, she was initially employed at the Institute of Sciences, where she dedicated herself again to the field of ichthyology. In 1948, she completed her study on fish in Albanian waters. However, this study would be published in 1955 under the name of the Russian Anatoli Poljakov and the pioneers in the field of ichthyology, Ndoc Rakaj and Ndoc Filipi.
Seeing the political developments in the country, Sabiha Kasimati expressed her dissatisfaction with the governance of the communist state. For this reason, she began to be persecuted by the State Security. Her name was associated with the explosion at the Soviet Embassy and she was accused of participating in terrorist organizations and collaborating with foreign agencies, accusations she would never accept.
A few days after the embassy incident, she was executed on February 26, 1951, along with 21 other intellectuals.
In 2011, the year that marked the 60th anniversary of her murder, the then President of the Republic of Albania, Bamir Topi, honored Sabiha Kasimati with the title “Honor of the Nation”.
The “House of Leaves” Museum reminds that during the dictatorship period (with a population of one million inhabitants in 1945 and approximately three million in 1990) in Albania, about 18,000 people were imprisoned for political motives, nearly 8,000 of whom were women in Albania. Over 6,000 people were executed with or without trial for political motives, including 450 women.
