Abstract This article analyses the system of internment and confinement established by Fascist Italy in occupied Albania between 1939 and 1943. Although wartime Albania has been extensively studied through the prism of resistance, ideological conflict, and postwar political violence, the practices of civilian repression implemented by the occupying authorities have received comparatively limited attention. Across both left- and right-leaning historiographical traditions, internment has remained peripheral to dominant interpretations of the occupation. Drawing on archival sources, the article examines internment as a core instrument of Fascist governance, shaped by administrative planning, territorial control, and security concerns. Confinement functioned as a preventive measure aimed at regulating populations deemed politically unreliable in a context of instability. The camps held civilians from across the region, Jewish refugees, and Albanians associated with a range of political currents, including monarchist, liberal, nonpartisan, and communist milieus. By situating internment within the broader coercive apparatus imposed by an occupying power, the article foregrounds civilian repression as a central feature of Fascist rule in Albania and contributes to wider debates on occupation, control, and wartime governance in Europe.
Pandelejmoni et al. (Fri,) studied this question.