In the company of a congressman and some others, I met him in Tirana, in 2005. It was an unusual and perhaps indelible experience. In my journal for this website, I wrote, Look, it’s easy to snicker at King Leka, or perhaps you’d like quotation marks...

In Gabon, their plane was surrounded by troops who claimed that Tirana had hired them to capture him; Leka held them off with a bazooka. In 1993 Leka finally set foot on Albanian soil, but for only a few hours before authorities bounced him, claiming...

He was crowned King Leka I by the Albanian exile community in Paris in 1961. Zogu returned to Albania in 1993 after the fall of communism but was not allowed to stay. He came back a second time in 1997 but fled when violence broke out after a disputed...

Tirana mayor Lulezim Basha said in a eulogy that "the whole Albanian royal family has made a great contribution to Albania and Kosovo and merits the honour and respect of Albanians". Leka was only a few days old when his father Zog was forced to leave...

Prince Leka II, swear in front of the body of my father that I will follow the road of King Zogu, of King Leka I to be at the service of the nation, the homeland," said Leka II, his only son. No opposition leaders were present at the ceremony. Erion...

After Albania's Communist regime fell in 1990, Leka Zogu made two disastrous attempts to return home - being thrown out during the first in 1993 and charged with leading an armed uprising during the second in 1997. The six-foot, five-inch (2-meter)...