Sigurimi

Sigurimi, short for Sigurimi i Shtetit (State Security), was the Albanian state security service and secret police under the communist regime from the mid-1940s until 1991. It served as the principal instrument of political control, combining intelligence gathering, surveillance, censorship, and the suppression of dissent. The agency reported to the Party of Labour’s security apparatus and the interior ministry, with broad authority to monitor and influence public life and private loyalty.

Throughout its existence, the Sigurimi maintained an extensive network of informants and undercover operatives inside Albania and among Albanians abroad. It conducted domestic surveillance, controlled media and cultural life, and targeted perceived opponents of the regime, including dissidents, religious groups, and rival political factions. The organization also carried out covert operations abroad to monitor and influence anti-regime activity within the Albanian diaspora.

Scholars describe the Sigurimi as a key mechanism of political repression, facilitating arrests, detentions, show trials, and other coercive measures. Its practices are a central topic in studies of Albania’s communist period and are widely cited in discussions of human rights abuses and state security apparatuses under one-party rule.

With the fall of communism and the regime’s collapse in 1991, the Sigurimi was dissolved and its functions were replaced by new post-communist security and intelligence institutions. The term remains a historical label for Albania’s security apparatus during the one-party state era.