Essad Pasha Toptani Essad Pasha Toptani or Esad Pasha Toptani ( , ca . 1863 – June 13 , 1920 ) , primarily known as Essad Pasha , was Ottoman army officer , Albanian deputy in Ottoman parliament and politician in the early twentieth century in Albania . He was cooperating with the Balkan League after the Balkan Wars and established a state in central Albania , based in Durrës , called the Republic of Central Albania . Life . Essad Pasha was born in 1863 in Tirana , Ottoman Empire ( today Republic of Albania ) . He belonged to prominent landowning family Toptani which founded contemporary Tirana . He became a supporter of the Young Turks following the assassination of his brother ( Gani Bey Toptani ) by forces loyal to Sultan Abdul Hamit II . He served as deputy for Albania in the Ottoman parliament and was proclaimed as Albanian king in Absentia for a few days in June 1920 , before his assassination . During the Albanian Revolt of 1912 Essad Pasha Toptani obliged himself to organize the uprising in Central Albania and Mirdita . He was one of the commanders of the Ottoman forces at Scutari , until the city surrendered to Montenegro in 1913 in the First Balkan War . Essad Pasha was allowed in return to leave the town with his army and all their weaponry to become involved in the struggle over power in central Albania . Official Serbia simultaneously helped a number of other small tribal chiefs who resisted Ismail Qemali ' s government , directing them towards cooperation with Essad Pasha . He was accused of fomenting a Peasant Revolt in Albania against William of Wied . Essad Pasha was exiled to Italy , without trial , but returned to Albania following the ouster of William in September by the movement of the Peasant Revolt in Albania . In autumn 1914 he decided to accept invitation of Senate of the Central Albania to return to Albania to take over the power . First , he had to provide financial backing for his government . Therefore he travelled to Niš , Kingdom of Serbia , where he and Serbian prime minister Pašić signed the secret Treaty of Serbian - Albanian Alliance on September 17 , 1914 . In October 1914 Essad Pasha returned to Albania . With Italian and Serbian financial backing he established armed forces in Dibër and captured interior of Albania and Dures . Serbian Prime Minister Nikola Pašić ordered that his followers be aided with money and arms . Though his rule was not stable because of the First World War . In the end of 1914 , Essad secretly agreed with the Greek government to support the annexation of the southern provinces , known to Greeks as Northern Epirus , to the Kingdom of Greece . He also succeeded in controlling much of central Albania until 1916 , when he left for Serbia and Greece to help them in their war against Austria - Hungary . After the war , he travelled to France , to represent Albania at the Paris Peace Conference . For the next two years , Essad Pasha remained in Paris , attempting to organize recognition for Albania from the Great Powers and reject the secret pact of London , which planned the division of Albania . During this time Tirana and much of central Albania was controlled by his Field Commander , Osman Bali . Death . On June 13 , 1920 , Avni Rustemi assassinated Essad Pasha in Paris when he left Hotel Continental . Although living in Paris and away from legislative governing of Albania , Essad Pasha claimed to still be the ruler of the state and attempted to represent Albania in the Paris Peace Conference . The governmental delegation didn ' t permit him to do so as they were going to represent Albania themselves . The assassination was largely seen as a heroic act as it has historically been seen as a signal of a new bourgeois revolution against the feudal traditions of Albania and a crossing bridge in the newly democratic - bourgeois values .