Byzantine-rite Christians in southern Albania sought communion with Rome in the modern era, and before the Second World War the Holy See erected an apostolic administration to care for them. Under the militantly atheist regime that outlawed all public worship in 1967, the community was driven underground and its clergy imprisoned; it re-emerged with the return of religious freedom in 1991 and remains one of the smallest of the Eastern Catholic Churches.

The faithful are served by the Apostolic Administration of Southern Albania, governed by an apostolic administrator appointed by the Holy See rather than by a hierarch of its own. The Divine Liturgy is celebrated in the Byzantine tradition in Albanian.

A very small Byzantine-rite Church sui iuris in southern Albania, served by an apostolic administration with its centre at Vlorë.

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Southern Albania, with its centre at Vlorë

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Around four thousand faithful