Blood feuds in Albania (1997) Exclusive Footage

The Rule of the Gun - Law and order have abandoned Albania. Nowhere is safe from banditry fuelled by hundreds of thousands of illegal weapons. Report by Martin Adler, 1997.

Ordinary people have resurrected an ancient Albanian text, the 'Book of Lek', a powerful creed of vengeance. Skander Lilaj is searching for his missing brother kidnapped from a cafe in Vlore. He finds a hidden badly mutilated body, but as he tries to report the crime the choas at the police station leaves us in no doubt that if Skander and his family are to get justice, they are going to have to get it for themselves. The family mourn at the graveside. They share their grief and frustration at the impotence of the police. But if they avenge the killing themselves they may start a blood fued that will echo through the generations to come.