Most of the area that would form the Albanian state was occupied at this time, by the Greeks in the south and the Serbs in the north. The last Ottoman census, conducted in 1908, counted 128,000 Orthodox Christians and 95,000 Muslims in the region. Of the Orthodox population, an estimated 30,000 to 47,000 spoke Greek exclusively. The rest of the Orthodox community spoke an Albanian patois at home, but was literate only in Greek, which was used in cultural, trading and economic activities. Moreover, they expressed a strong pro-Greek feeling, and were the first to support the following breakaway autonomist movement. Considering these conditions, loyalty in Northern Epirus to an Albanian government competing in an anarchy, whose leaders were mostly Muslim, could not be guaranteed. The concept of an independent Albanian state was supported by the Great European Powers, particularly Austro-Hungary and Italy. Both powers were seeking to control Albania, which, in the words of Italian Foreign Minister Tommaso Tittoni, would give whichever managed this "incontestable supremacy in the Adriatic". The Serbian possession of Shkodër and the possibility of the Greek border running a few miles south of Vlore was therefore strongly resisted by these states. In September 1913, an International Commission of the European Powers convened to determine the boundary between Greece and Albania. The delegates of the commission aligned themselves into two camps: those of Italy and Austro-Hungary insisted that the Northern Epirus districts were Albanian, while those of the Triple Entente (the United Kingdom, France, and Russia) took the view that although the older generations in some villages spoke Albanian, the younger generation was Greek in intellectual outlook, sentiment, and aspirations. Under Italian and Austro-Hungarian pressure, the commission determined that the region of Northern Epirus would be ceded to Albania. With the delineation of the exact boundaries of the new state, the region of Northern Epirus was awarded to Albania under the terms of the Protocol of Florence, signed on 17 December 1913. On 21 February 1914, the ambassadors of the Great Powers delivered a note to the Greek government asking for the Greek army's evacuation of the area. Greek Prime Minister Eleftherios Venizelos acceded to this in hopes of a favorable solution to Greece's other outstanding problem: the recognition of Greek sovereignty over the islands of the North Eastern Aegean. This turn of events was highly unpopular among the pro-Greek party in the area.