Panajot Plaku

Panajot Plaku (* 1918 in Elbasan , † 1957 in Yugoslavia ) was an Albanian general and politician of the Party of Labor of Albania , who was deposed in 1957 for an alleged attempted coup against Enver Hoxha and espionage for the Yugoslav secret service Uprava državne bezbednosti (UDB) then was murdered after fleeing to Yugoslavia.

Life

Plaku was a son of Josif Plaku, who worked as a lawyer in Bilisht and was an opponent of King Ahmet Zogu , and his wife Vjollca Plaku. From this marriage two other sons, Jorgo Plaku and Kalo Plaku, emerged. Panajot attended school in Elbasan . During the Italian occupation of Albania , his father and an older brother were deported to Porto Romano near Durrës between 1942 and 1943 . He himself joined a partisan group that operated in the area of the Morava River , while his brother Jorgo Plaku had been a partisan since 1941 and died in the liberation struggle. He himself then took part in the formation of the attack brigade Brigada e V-të Sulmuese of the National Liberation Army Ushtria Nacional-Çlirimtare e Shqipërisë (UNÇSh) and later became deputy commander of the brigade.

After the founding of the People's Socialist Republic of Albania, he was General of the Armed Forces (Forcat e Armatosura të Shqipërisë) and commander of a division and assistant to the defense minister. He was also a member of the Central Committee of the Party of Labor of Albania (Partia e Punës e Shqipërisë, PPSh) .

On July 19, 1954, in the third legislative term, he became a member of the Albanian parliament Kuvendi Popullor , of which he was a member until May 17, 1957, as well as Minister without Portfolio in the government of Prime Minister Mehmet Shehu .

In this capacity, he took part in a party conference in Tirana led by Defense Minister Beqir Balluku in 1956 and, together with General Dali Ndreu and his wife Liri Gega , demanded the overthrow of the General Secretary of the PPSh, Enver Hoxha , and Prime Minister Mehmet Shehu. At this meeting, numerous delegates also requested information about the fate of Koçi Xoxe , Tuk Jakova , Bedri Spahiu and other prominent party members and their rehabilitation .

After Balluku Hoxha's wife Nexhmije Hoxha had informed of the coup attempt, Enver Hoxha managed to maintain control of the party. The intervention of Balluku and Shehus then ushered in a political cleansing , which began after Hoxha's return to Tiranas with the arrest of party critics of the regime .

Ndreu and Liri Gega were arrested, while Plaku managed to escape to Yugoslavia via the Qafë Thana pass shortly before his arrest on May 17, 1957 . Like the other two, he was accused of being an agent of the Yugoslav secret service UDB and of having betrayed internal secrets to the Yugoslav daily newspaper Borba .

On May 28, 1957, he was expelled as a member of the Central Committee of the PPSh. A short time later he was murdered by agents of the Albanian secret service in Yugoslavia.

Web links

• History of the People's Assembly, p. 179 (PDF; 18.3 MB)
• Hazbiu, sherr me këshilltarin rus për Panajot Plakun . In: Shekulli of April 29, 2013
• Enver Hoxha: The Khruschevites. "The Carrot" and "The Stick"
• Flori Bruqi: Panajot Plaku, gjenerali që zbuloi sekretet e Enverit tek gazeta "Borba" (May 5, 2010)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Hoxha on Shehu , pp. 8, 18 et al. (PDF file; 142 kB)
2. ↑ Hoxha on Shehu , pp. 8, 18 et al. (PDF file; 142 kB)
3. ↑ List Of The Member Of Leading Albanian Party ( Memento of the original from March 4, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.