More thrills than skills – A half-life in journalism, part 29

Over the next few weeks, allmediascotland.com is to publish, each weekday, edited extracts from the memoirs of Scottish war correspondent, Paul Harris. ‘More thrills than skills: A half-life in journalism’, is being scheduled for publication next year.

THINGS were not to get any better and, alas, Spaho’s optimism would prove ill-placed.

Four years later, and the dawning of 1997, brought riots, civil collapse and, eventually, international intervention.

The south of the country descended into chaos and things weren’t much better in the capital, Tirana.

Just south of the central town of Fier, you passed into the lawless south. I inadvisedly decided to explore it.