World Notes ALBANIA

They claimed it was a language problem. If so, members of Albania's national soccer team and its accompanying under-21 team seemed to have confused the word duty-free with "all free" during a recent three-hour stopover at London's Heathrow Airport. The party of 37 loaded up with $3,400 worth of goods at a duty-free shop, then left without paying.

"By the time they got to the gate, there were watches everywhere," said one airport official. The police were not impressed with the soccer players' alleged language difficulties and locked up 30 of them. After 24 hours of searching unsuccessfully for a translator, the police decided it would be easier to call it off, and escorted the Albanians aboard their flight to Iceland. According to one official, the footballers may also have had language difficulties in Rome, because they were carrying items from that airport's duty-free shop.