I have been going through some links I saved when I used to travel a lot in the Balkans. Sadly many of the links are now dead, but I did find this lovely map of the rail network in Albania in 2011, including departure times:
@jon It wasn't a great network even then, but the Albania leg of your 2024 Balkans trip would have been more interesting (or at least more rail-based) if there were still trains to Shkodra and especially Pogradec.
The attackers utilized a combination of tools during the campaign, including an executable wiper (NACL.exe) requiring administrator privileges to erase data by removing the boot signature from the Master Boot Record (MBR).
Albanian Plan to Use AI to Align Laws With EU Questioned
Rama says his government will work with Chat GPT to align Albanian laws with the EU and so cut translation and lawyers' costs – but some experts say it's not that simple.
Albania Returns Valuable Stolen Icons to North Macedonia
Twent icons stolen from Macedonian Orthodox churches over many years and seized by Albanian police a decade ago were finally returned to their country of origin on Friday.
Today in Labor History December 11, 1990: Students and workers demonstrated throughout Albania in protests that eventually led to the fall of communism, with a General Strike in 1991. And the communists were thoroughly trounced in the elections of March 1992.
An interesting old booklet we came across in the National Library in #Belgrade
Fairly simple and straightfoward rules from 1914 on how POWs were to be treated.
Issued after the start of #WWI and #Serbian victories in that year, which resulted in several tens of thousands of Austro-Hungarian soldiers being taken prisoner. Some 30 000 of them would be escorted with the Serbian army through #Albania in 1915. and handed over to Italians on the coast.
A sorprendere però sono i costi esorbitanti dell’operazione. Il decreto prevede una spesa che si aggira intorno ai 60 milioni all’anno solo per il 2024, a cui si arriva a circa 90 nei prossimi cinque anni. A questo si dovranno aggiungere alcuni costi che nel disegno di legge non sono stati indicati – come i rimborsi spese per gli avvocati che non possono fare udienze da remoto – tra cui le spese da liquidare all’Albania per l’accordo e quella per le navi per trasportare i migranti. In tutto circa 200 milioni. In valore assoluto, rispetto ai 19 che vengono spesi per i nuovi Cpr da costruire in Italia fino al 2024, la proporzione è di circa 10 volte. Se proporzionato al numero di migranti rinchiusi nei centri invece stiamo parlando del 30% in più, circa un terzo: per ogni migrante nei 10 Cpr italiani (1.100 al massimo) lo Stato spende 16 mila euro contro i 22 mila per i 9 mila che, al massimo, potranno restare in Albania (la stima è di circa 720 al mese).
Portugal backs EU accession for Albania, North Macedonia, Montenegro
Portugal backs the EU accession bids of Albania, North Macedonia, and Montenegro, the office of outgoing Prime Minister António Costa stated on Monday following his three-country tour.
The new interim CEO of #OpenAI is from #Albania. A woman from the #Balkans is running one of the most influential tech companies today. We need more of that.
51 countries this time call out #China for its human rights crimes against the #Uyghurs. It's mostly the usual suspects - Europe, US allies, and countries that recognize #Taiwan.
A few surprises, like #Fiji, #Liberia and #Moldova. #Ukraine also joined this time, after accidentally abstaining in a UN vote last year.
As far as I can tell, the only Muslim-majority country that joined is #Albania. Notably, just one EU member missing - #Hungary
In the waters of Lake Ohrid near the Albania and North Macedonia border, archaeologists have found wooden stakes that they believe are the oldest remains of a lakeside human settlement in Europe.
According to Froseda Tola, an archaeologist working on the site, the stakes date back to the early Neolithic period around 5,800 BC.
The road through the Osum Valley to the Osum Canyon stretched out. It went endlessly up and again down to the river. We took our time, enjoyed #cycling and the great #landscape around us, drank coffee in small villages, brushed our teeth at a fantastic viewpoint and were amazed when we finally reached the #canyon and saw the massive, gigantic, pillar-like rock walls. #albania#balkan#travel#BikeTooter#adventure#nomadslife
Bulgarian law enforcement discovered a criminal scheme to ship dual-use equipment to Russia
According to the data, so far these goods have been traded and exported for the military operations taking place on the territory of Ukraine. 12 participants in the criminal scheme have been detained - five of them foreigners, of whom three are citizens of the Russian Federation, one of #Albania and one of #Belarus
Russia, expelled from the United Nations Human Rights Council in 2022, seeks to rejoin the Geneva-based body.
Several U.N. diplomats and analysts suggest that Russia aims to leverage its control over wartime grain shipments and arms and energy sales to gain support in a secret vote scheduled for Oct. 10. Alongside Russia, #Albania and #Bulgaria are competing for two seats representing eastern Europe.
🇦🇱 🇷🇸 A new approach to joining the #European Union is needed, according to both the Prime Minister of #Albania and President of #Serbia, who bemoaned the length of time the process is taking for their countries.
On the side of the road, one could also see the defunct single train track from Elbasan to Prremjas ( #Albania) and the (seemingly active) single train track from Ohrid (#NorthMacedonia) north.
Would be nice for the EU to support candidate countries‘ rail where possible, wouldn’t it be @jon?