TIRANA, Oct 24 (Reuters) – Albanian riot police used tear gas, water cannons and rubber bullets to disperse protesters who threw rocks at officers and started a fire at the door of the agriculture ministry in the capital, Tirana, on Saturday.
Student-led demonstrations, fuelled by anger over perceived government corruption, a lack of jobs and poor education standards, have engulfed central Tirana and spread to other cities this month.
Demonstrators demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Edi Rama have set fire to government buildings as well as banks, smashed shop windows and pulled up paving stones to throw at police.
The unrest, which followed months of largely peaceful summer protests against a luxury coastal development backed by US President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, poses the biggest challenge yet to Rama, who has governed since 2013 and won a fourth term in office last year.
The protesters gathered on Saturday around 2 p.m. (1200 GMT) in front of the education ministry, and threw stones and rocks at police.
The police pushed them away and they dispersed to several locations in the city.
“Albanians have woken up,” said 28-year-old protester Daniel Tahiri, who described the government as a “dictatorship with the clothes of democracy.”
Another protester, 29-year-old Orgeta Likaj, said people wanted Rama to know that Albanians no longer want him because of corruption and scandals.
(Reporting by Fatos Bytyci; Writing by Ivana Sekularac; Editing by Rod Nickel)
