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Most of the KLA camps were located at old Albanian military bases, some vicinity the Alb/Yugo border north of Bajram Curri & near Kukes, but the biggest were put far away from Serbian counter-action in central Albania vicinity Burrel & Tirana. The training at that time was supported by the U.S. & the Albanian military, but the camps have been empty since late summer in 1999 for the obvious reason that they were no longer needed. Later, ethnic Albanian extremists established training and base camps in the 5 kilometer ground safety zone (GSZ) established by NATO inside the Kosovo/Serbian border. The purpose of the GSZ was to separate forces to ensure no incidents, but a side-effect was to give the Albanians an area where neither KFOR or the Serb forces were allowed--and they took advantage of it. The GSZ is where the UCK forces were organized, trained, and staged for their initial attacks into FYROM in Spring 2001. When it was belatedly shut down, the UCK had established sufficient control over the Tetovo & Sar Mtn area to move their ops right into FYROM.

The only known Al Qaida camp in Albania was identified and shut down in 98(?date?--it is starting to all run together for me) with most terrorists arrested, 1 killed, and the others extradited--some to be later executed. The camp--like many terror facilities, contrary to popular perception, was not in a remote area where any unusual activity would be noted, but instead on the outskirts of Tirana in an old food processing factory compound. For those familiar with the area, it was just off the main Tirana-Durres road near the intersection with the airport road. Obviously, lots of nearby traffic & movement to camouflage the terrorist activities and also close to a large city, an airport, and the seaport of Durres. Unless you have a host country like Taliban-run Afghanistan, or a place with no government like Somalia, or else an odd-ball situation like the GSZ next to Kosovo, the terrorists will do their best to blend in with the normal activity--so busy areas with lots of vehicles & people coming & going are where you will find them. Bottom line, there are certainly no overt KLA or other terrorist training camps in northern Albania or elsewhere in Albania and; if there are terrorists present, they are in hiding and most likely in a populated area versus some part of the country-side where they would stick out like a sore thumb.