Albania’s opposition violently interrupt parliament session after lawmaker is sentenced to prison

Albanian opposition lawmakers violently disrupted a Parliament session Monday to protest the imprisonment of a fellow legislator for alleged slander.

The conservative Democratic Party of Albania has long accused the ruling Socialist Party of usurping all the powers, including the judiciary, and staged violent protests against the government since 2013.

Democrats shoved microphones off tables, hurled objects at the seats of the Parliament's speaker and government ministers and burned chairs, saying Ervin Salianji's prison sentence was politically motivated. They have also called for protests they say will block the capital, Tirana, starting next week.

In 2018, Salianji demanded the resignation of the Socialist Party's then-governing interior minister Fatmir Xhafaj after a video circulated where two men claimed his brother was involved in illegal activities. The...