The news from Albania is for the time being favourable
to the Turkish Government. Sheflret Torgut Pasha, after clearing the Katchanik Pass, has broken Ilia force into mobile columns, and forced the Tchernakiva Pass after twe days' fighting, all the deserted villages along the route of the troops being burned for complicity. The Times corre- spondent at Constantinople gives some interesting details as to the movement and. its leaders. Is& Boletin, who repre- sents the old anarchical tradition which Abd-ul-Hamid did so much to perpetuate in Worth-East Albania, "has been in arms against all recognised authority foe- years past." Hasa= Hussein's alleged participation is a surprise, as ha helped the Young Turks in 1908, and is said to be a strong Constitu- tionalist. Idris Sefer is a Moslem convert from Roman Catholicism. Much depends on the attitude of the Reanaa Catholic hill tribes, but so far, in spite of rumours to the contrary, they have remained neutraL The question of dis- arming the hill tribes is one of the chief difficulties of the situation, geographically as well as politically. In view of the constant intertribal feuds, the dwellers in the more accessible valleys will naturally decline to surrender their rifles if the mountaineers retain their arms. A general diaarmament being almost impracticable, the creation of a tribal Militia among the border clans is regarded as a possible solution of the problem.
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