Albania Engulfed By Anarchy Americans Evacuated As Chaos Swamps Europe’s Poorest Nation

U.S. troops flew into Tirana to evacuate Americans trapped in chaos as, one by one, Albania’s few remaining tranquil towns descended into anarchy Thursday.

Gangs ransacked armories, civilians navigated tanks and children played with assault rifles.

Helpless army commanders asked for Western military involvement after the unrest that has engulfed southern Albania for days spread north, east and west, destroying the last semblance of order and leaving at least 12 people dead and 50 others injured.

The president’s son and daughter and five other family members were among the masses fleeing Albania, arriving in the port of Bari, Italy, aboard an Italian ferry, an Italian coast guard officer said.

Late Thursday night, a tank was seen moving slowly along the main boulevard in the Albanian capital. It stopped near the Defense Ministry.

Responding to the increasing threat, four U.S. military helicopters based on warships in the Ionian Sea began evacuating Americans earlier in the day. Up to 2,000 U.S. citizens are in the country, and State Department spokesman Nicholas Burns said the flights could continue for days.

Burns told reporters in Washington that U.S. Ambassador Marina Lino and 17 core embassy staffers would remain in the capital for the time being.

Italian helicopters also airlifted 400 people from Tirana, and Britain and other embassies hurried with plans to get their nationals out.

The unrest threatens to swamp neighboring countries, particularly Italy and Greece, with another flood of refugees. Because there are sizable ethnic Albanian populations in Serbia’s Kosovo province and in Macedonia, those chronically unstable areas also are at risk.

Macedonian border guards said they had fired on seven armed Albanians trying to cross the mountainous frontier on Thursday, repulsing the group and causing the seven to flee.

In Tirana, guards deserted the central prison, allowing 600 inmates, including ex-President Ramiz Alia and another prominent leader of the former Communists to get away. Then, the guards returned to loot the prison.

Pressure was building on current President Sali Berisha to leave office - the one move that might help restore order.

“Berisha accepted that he has no institutional control,” Skender Gjinushi of the opposition Social Democrats reported after meeting with the president. “He has no army, no police, Tirana is in total anarchy.”

The new eruption of violence left virtually no community of any size untouched. The weeks-long uprising was sparked by the collapse of high-risk investment schemes, draining the savings of thousands of Albanians, and has grown into anti-government protests.

At least 12 people were reported killed throughout the country, many of them by random gunfire. Citizens increasingly have been taking arms from looted armories, more for protection than out of political protest.

Gjinushi’s Social Democrats and the Forum for Democracy, a loose umbrella organization of opposition groups, have called on Berisha to quit.

NATO, meanwhile, met in emergency session in Brussels, Belgium, while in New York, Albania and neighboring Italy both asked for a special U.N. Security Council meeting to discuss the crisis.

The problem in Albania appeared increasingly to be a total collapse of order rather than one in which opposing forces could be separated.

In Tirana, shopkeepers were boarding up storefronts. State TV cut into children’s programing for a special newscast, leading with the ominous announcement that 200 “citizens” had volunteered to help police restore order in Tirana. It said they warned Tirana residents to obey the law, or they would open fire.

State radio said Berisha and opposition political parties appealed to the Western European Union, the political arm of NATO, for military help.

It was not clear what kind of assistance they were seeking but the insurgents overran armories in Shkodra, northern Albania’s biggest town and a Berisha stronghold, leaving four dead and 22 wounded, hospital officials said.

Trouble also was reported for the first time in Durres, the Adriatic port and second-most populous city. Three people died in Elbasan, two each in Korca and Cerrik, and one in Puka.

In Italy, officials there said much of the Albanian navy and at least three military helicopters with people sought refuge in the country - bringing family members with them. Some asked for political asylum.

A Honduran vessel commandeered in Durres was headed toward Brindisi, Italy, with about 100 Albanians, officials in the Italian port said.

Berisha’s family members, along with five armed bodyguards, arrived at the landing in Durres in a Mercedes with diplomatic plates, the AGI news agency quoted a fellow passenger as saying. The ferry door was about to close but the bodyguards forced the crew to open it and let them aboard, passenger Cosimo Piccirillo said.