Said bey Kryeziu

Biography

Said Bey was born in Gjakova, Vilayet of Kosovo, Ottoman Empire. He was a member of the influential Kryeziu family. His father, Riza Bey Kryeziu, was one of the activists of Albanian national movements of the early 20th century.
In 1933 he went to Paris, where he studied diplomacy for a short time. He returned from France and resided in Belgrade from 1939 to 1941, supervised by the Yugoslav authorities, and helping Albanians to go back and fight against the Italians. In 1941, after trying to launch an uprising in Albania, he got arrested together with his two brothers, Hasan and Gani, and imprisoned in Italy. He was released in September 1943, and made it back to Kosovo where he came in contact with other anti-communist resistance fighters like Llazar Fundo. During all this time he was in contact with British intelligence, in particular with Julian Amery. After his capture by the Albanian partisans, he was released through the intervention of Allied Headquarters in Bari. He then fled to Greece and reached Rome in November 1944.
Said was one of the co-founders, on 26 August 1949, of the "Free Albania" National Committee in Paris, led by Mit'hat Frashëri, a parallel government in exile of the anti-communists. The committee was disbanded in 1955, with Albania joining the United Nations. Said moved to New York City in 1959 where he worked as a bank clerk, and he died there in 1993.