/ 15 February 1999

LEKA BAILED OUT

LEKA, the flamboyant exiled pretender to the Albanian throne, was granted R15000 bail on Monday after being arrested on arms charges. Leka was arrested with three other men at his Johannesburg home on February 5 after police found a large quantity of firearms, ammunition, anti-personnel mines and rocket launchers. Transferred from his jail cell to a Johannesburg hospital last week with a perforated ulcer, he is due to appear before the court in April, the official said. He was given diplomatic status and immunity, recently revoked, by the former white-majority National Party government in the 1970s.