Mid'hat Bey Frashëri (also known by his pen name as Lumo Skëndo; ; 25 March 1880 – 3 October 1949) was an Albanian diplomat, writer and politician. The son of Abdyl Frashëri, one of the most important activists of the Albanian National Awakening in 1908 he participated in the Congress of Monastir. In 1942 he became the president of Balli Kombëtar (National Front), an Albanian fascist collaborationist and anti-communist movement during the Second World War. Frashëri is referred to as one of the fathers of modern Albanian nationalism. Biography Early life Mid'hat bey Frashëri was the son of prominent Albanian politician and statesman from 19th century Abdyl Frashëri (who initiated the movement of a wide autonomy from Ottoman Empire) and nephew of the poets and nationalists Naim Frashëri and Sami Frashëri. He was born in Yanya in the Ottoman Empire (present day Ioannina, Greece) in 1880 and was raised in Istanbul, where his family worked in the Ottoman administration and organised the Albanian nationalist movement. In 1897 Mid'hat Frashëri was arrested by Ottoman authorities for having a copy of the newspaper Albania, and was released after intervention by his uncle Sami Frashëri. During 1901, Mid'hat Frashëri published a biography on his uncle Naim Frashëri. Giving up his studies of pharmacology, he worked for the Ottoman administration in the vilayet of Salonika from 1905 to 1910. Frashëri published a yearly almanac Kalendari Kombiar (National Calendar) that was printed in Sofia and distributed in the Balkans from there. The publication held moderate positions were Frashëri advocated for national unity, development of Albanian education, schools and literature and opposed foreign power intervention in Albanian affairs. Frashëri also called for government reforms an alliance with Macedonians to achieve those aims, but he was against armed resistance. Regarding the Albanian question and geopolitics, Frashëri was known in Albanian circles of the time to be anti-Austro-Hungarian and anti-Italian. Using the pen name Lumo Skendo, he began publishing the weekly newspaper "Lirija" in Salonika, which lasted until 1910. While running Lirija, Midhat wrote an open letter to Ismail Qemali, expressing his strong disapproval of Qemali's policy of friendship with Greece. He participated in the Congress of Monastir in 1908, and in January of the next year, he began editing a monthly magazine entitled "Diturija", a magazine based on the cultural, literary and scholarly interest of Albania. In 1908, the Albanian club dealing with cultural and political issues