Albin Kurti: Great loss to no longer have Shaban Murati's far-sighted advice, he left behind 19 works

The President of Kosovo, Albin Kurti, has expressed his condolences on the passing of diplomat Shaban Murati.

Kurti praises Murat as a senior chronicler of Albanian relations with the region who left behind 19 works that help us orient ourselves in the geopolitical and diplomatic realm, as Albanians, as Kosovo and as Albania.

Kurti's reaction:

I learned today about the sudden passing of the distinguished diplomat and ambassador, Mr. Shaban Murati. For me, every meeting with him and his work has been significant. He was not just a diplomat, he was not just an ambassador. Shaban Murati was a senior chronicler of Albanian relations with the region, the continent to which we belong, and the world. Like few others, Shaban Murati wrote a monumental work on the geopolitical positions of Albanians.

In his 19 works, Shaban Murati helped us orient ourselves in the geopolitical and diplomatic realm, as Albanians, as Kosovo, and as Albania. He was critical of the inadequacies of our diplomacy, of some of the attitudes of European diplomacy in the region, and of the danger of Russia’s harmful focus on the Balkans and beyond. Ambassador Murati has written and spoken forcefully about the vital regional alliances of Albanians with Croatia and Turkey, as he has also done about the mindsets and taboos that truncate the fullness of the pan-Albanian political vision, especially on issues and the history of territories and borders.

It is a great loss for us to no longer have the ambassador and his benevolent and far-sighted advice in the times to come. But, on the other hand, we are confident in the longevity of his reflections. We invite on this occasion all our diplomats and students of the humanities to turn to the books of Ambassador Shaban Murati, to understand the positions of Albanians in the course of the dynamics of international relations and national diplomacy. We lost a man, but we always have his thoughts in our libraries.

With this memorial to Shaban Murati, I express my condolences to the Murati family, friends of Ambassador Murati, the diplomatic corps and his colleagues, for the loss of a great thinker of the national issue!