The publication of two joint declarations by the PD, PR and PSD on their stance toward the fascist coup d’état in Moscow and toward several issues concerning the whole population today greatly unsettled the PS. ZB, as its spokesperson, launched a new attack to defend the PS, with its usual, rusty arguments. ZP of August 25 says that the coup in the USSR and the overthrow of Gorbachev, that is, the fear of a return to dictatorship, were supposedly the principal reason for closer cooperation among the genuine opposition parties. This is not true. First: Before the coup in Moscow, at a meeting of its National Council, the PR discussed the situation in the country and set out a number of tasks for coping with the extremely difficult situation we were experiencing. These tasks, as assessed by the PR National Council, are not partisan in nature, but national in scope. Their implementation, therefore, would be accomplished more quickly and effectively through cooperation among the genuine democratic opposition forces. This was the primary reason for the meetings and joint declarations of the PD, PR and PSD. Second: The danger of a return to dictatorship has not completely disappeared. Therefore, the struggle against it is not tilting at windmills, as ZP tries to make it seem. The “Labor windmills” continue desperately to wave their arms, waiting for a more favorable wind to set the mill in motion. And the wretches hoped that the coup in Moscow would be that favorable wind! The Enverists’ faces lit up with excitement. Their wives, in the reception rooms, declared: “Just wait a little longer. The pear has its stem at the back!” In the middle of the night, the dark forces distributed portraits of Enver Hoxha, putting them into the hands of the apparatus. Secret meetings began; the first steps toward organizing the putsch were taken. But the Soviet people soon showed the Stalinists where they belonged, and just as quickly Albania returned to the grip of the turmoil and agitation. This proved that dictatorship cannot return. But the roots have still not been torn out. Otherwise, how can the repeated mass exodus be explained, rooted in the poverty cultivated by the PPSH over 45 years and encouraged by the illegal activity of certain State Security structures, in order to “prove” that democracy brought it about? Otherwise, how can the blind determination to keep our flag, emblem and other symbols of communism before our eyes be explained, when they have now disappeared even in their birthplace, along with the Communist Party of the USSR? Albania is the only country in Europe that still keeps them. Do you gentlemen of the PS want to keep our country as the “beacon of socialism” and spread darkness? Does this not show that you are the ones tilting at windmills? You accuse the opposition of exploiting the situation to restore one-party rule. O logic! What nonsense is spoken in your name! Cooperation among three opposition parties supposedly establishes one-party rule, while complete unity of views between, for example, the PS and PE is supposedly pluralism. This new experience could be studied and disseminated by the luminaries of the Institute of Marxism-Leninism at the PPSH Central Committee. It is a pity they have now been assigned other duties... You accuse the opposition of fighting for power and armchairs. Indeed: why should the opposition want power and armchairs? Are not those Labor Party people the ones who have enjoyed them for 47 years? They are used to them and cannot give them up; apparently, they have left the people hungry and destitute. Now they swear to us that they are renewing themselves! From now on, “Whatever the PS says, the people will do; whatever the people say, the PS will do”! Enough! Truly, enough! The PS’s armchair-seekers are holding on to their seats by every Machiavellian means. They simply dislike the name, so they put on the label of an opposition party. They call us “right-wing forces led by

PDSH» (ZP, August 27). Professional idiocy is inevitable even for a journalist who, for 47 years in a row, has spoken of “mother parties” and “daughter parties,” and claimed that Albania could not exist “without Marshal Tito’s Yugoslavia,” then could not be “renewed” without the “glorious Soviet Union,” and, after the next “renewal,” could not exist without “Mao Zedong’s great China.” ZP writers cannot understand cooperation among genuine democratic opposition forces without “discovering” who is leading them. If they are basing this on the order in which the parties’ names appear—PD, PR and PSD—we remind you that they are listed alphabetically. We neither accept being led nor seek to lead in relations among our parties. There are no big and small parties. To anyone who might declare, “We are the biggest and best-quality party,” we would recall the answer Einstein gave to a braggart: “Our task is to work. It is for others to assess our work.” ZP writers say, “Everyone together against the PS, everyone together against the President.” But if you have realized that everyone is against you, why don’t you think about it and change the course that has put you at odds with everyone? Do you imagine that the next elections will take place according to your March 31 script? Apparently, the President is in great need of the PS’s support. Our position is clear: the heat has passed with the cucumber [a saying]. But in its August 25 issue, ZP published the article “The Fadil Paçrami Affair in a New Perspective.” It discusses many things, but it is not easy to find where the rabbit is hiding in the bush. It is hard to tell whether all those words attack or defend F. Pacrami. But a careful reading will reveal the “rabbit,” which appears in just a few lines: at that time, responsibility “also lay with the relevant department of the PPSH Central Committee, specifically R. Alia.” So, dear reader! ZP is informing you for the first time that R. Alia was supposedly opposed to Enver Hoxha as far back as 1974! At that time, he was supposedly charged with responsibility for actions and opinions against the Party line. Having held the highest party responsibility after Enver Hoxha, he now emerges here as a leading dissident. A journalistic masterpiece of maneuvering. Certainly, a renewed masterpiece. In recent days, amid the feverish atmosphere of creating new parties, there has also been talk of a renewed Party of Labor that would break away from the PS as its most conservative wing. The chief experts have devised a clever plan! The PS will produce a group of conservatives, the hotheads, and thereby become more socialist than it is today. The Nexhmijes will defend the “architect,” while the young pioneers will cheer: “Now we are completely renewed!” But who does not know that the latter came out of “Nexhmije’s greenhouses”? Only the ordinary communists, most of whom are honest people, are truly troubled. Nostalgia and their word of honor hold them back, but they are becoming increasingly convinced that they are sailing in a rudderless ship, a ship that has lost its compass. Should they jump overboard while the shore is still close? ZP complains that, in this cooperation among the PD, PR and PSD, “the PS and the other opposition parties are left out of the dialogue.” Apparently, all the parties are opposition parties. But against whom?! The door has not been closed to it. If you accept what is written in the joint declarations of the PD, PR and PSD, say so openly and come to cooperate with us. Or will you perhaps follow Gorbachev’s example? Will you stage his coup? That is up to you. From what has happened so far, no one can be convinced that the PS has been renewed. There has only been a renewal of names and words. It has not been renewed; it has merely been reprinted. VANGJUSH GAMBETA

For physicists and physics enthusiasts, this explanation may be unnecessary. The Doppler effect is observed when one moves at high—very high—speeds. Under these conditions, as we approach the red light, it appears green. A great deal of confusion will be created in front of traffic lights, at intersections.

Insults, whatever form they take and whoever utters them, are hurtful to anyone who has not lost a sense of honor and human dignity. But some insults are extremely grave and inflict wounds on people’s souls that never heal. I would place in this category the insults a head of state may direct at his own citizens, as our esteemed President did to the Albanians in his interview with journalist Karl Buhala, published in «Zydojce Cajtung» on 21.8.1991. To evade the journalist’s questions about the causes of the nationwide Albanian tragedy known as the “exodus,” President Alia, with a coldness inexplicable in the head of a state on the brink of complete catastrophe, declared that “the exodus is first and foremost due to economic reasons... people do not want to work...” They read newspapers, discuss things with one another, and do not work... Even if we heard these words from some foreigner entirely unfamiliar with Albania, we would be consumed by righteous anger and would never forgive him either his condescension or his naivety. But what can one think when words like these—whose cynicism defies comparison—are spoken by the head of one’s own state, whom one sees in photographs, in newspaper pages and on television almost every day, receiving and seeing off prominent people of this state and this people, smiling and giving advice? When I read Mr. President’s words in the interview, as reproduced in the newspaper «Tirana», I was reminded of some wise advice given a century and a half ago by Lord Fikëllmont, who said: “The injustice of a poor man harms the interests of a rich man, whereas the injustice of a great man always creates a large number of misfortunes. Therefore, in matters of state, one must know when to stop on the wrong path and avoid doing harm, because persistence can turn an error into a virtue. The greater the heaps with which you try to cover (the error), the more you bring it to light.” We are sorry to remind you, Mr. President, that this is not the first time you have insulted your fellow countrymen and women. When you spoke about the embassy refugees in the speech you gave last year at your friend Antani Athanas’s restaurant, you referred to the economic refugees in Boston by saying that there is no forest without pigs. You called the sons of the people who fled poverty and dictatorship pigs, and their homeland—which is ours too—a forest abandoned by pigs. Did it not occur to you, Mr. President, that when pigs abandon a forest, their shelter—

Our readers are familiar with the joint declaration of the Democratic Party, the Republican Party and the Social Democratic Party, through which the opposition, represented by these three main parties, unites around its demands to accelerate the achievements of democracy and the democratic process in Albania. But how and why did this joint declaration come about, as the first step toward a vital alliance of the Albanian opposition? The answer is simple: because of the extremely difficult economic situation, reflected in and worsened by the slow steps taken by the government of national stability, whose decisions (including those of Parliament) are either implemented late or not implemented at all. This is because, apart from a few ministerial posts and some positions on the executive committees of the people’s councils in the districts, the village administrations and the many state organizations have remained as they were under one-party rule, almost unchanged or untouched. Or perhaps no action has been taken; and if they are not like that, they are still imbued with the routine mentality and practices of the Party of Labor. The question arose: Could this situation not have been foreseen? At this nearly hopeless economic time, caused by the slow steps taken by the government of national stability, whose decisions (including those of Parliament) are either implemented late or not implemented at all. This is because, apart from a few ministerial posts and some positions on the executive committees of the people’s councils in the districts, the village administrations and the many state organizations have remained as they were under one-party rule, almost unchanged or untouched. Or perhaps no action has been taken; and if they are not like that, they are still imbued with the routine mentality and practices of the Party of Labor. The question arose: Could it not have been foreseen that, at this critical economic stage engulfing the country, the country’s stability would not be given a quicker breath of life? But how can it be explained that the government of national stability includes only opposition parties and a section selected by the Party of Labor? Could this situation not have been foreseen, at a nearly hopeless economic time caused by the slow steps of the government of national stability, whose decisions are either implemented late or not implemented at all? This is because, apart from a few ministerial posts and some positions on the executive committees of the people’s councils in the districts, the village administrations and the many state organizations have remained as they were under one-party rule, almost unchanged or untouched. Or perhaps no action has been taken; and if they are not like that, they are still imbued with the routine mentality and practices of the Party of Labor. The question arose: Could it not have been foreseen that, at this critical economic stage engulfing the country, the country’s stability would not be given a quicker breath of life? But how can it be explained that the government of national stability includes only opposition parties and a section selected by the Party of Labor? Could this situation not have been foreseen, at a nearly hopeless economic time caused by the slow steps of the government of national stability, whose decisions are either implemented late or not implemented at all? The answer is simple: because of the extremely difficult economic situation, reflected in and worsened by the slow steps taken by the government of national stability, whose decisions (including those of Parliament) are either implemented late or not implemented at all. This is because, apart from a few ministerial posts and some positions on the executive committees of the people’s councils in the districts, the village administrations and the many state organizations have remained as they were under one-party rule, almost unchanged or untouched. Or perhaps no action has been taken; and if they are not like that, they are still imbued with the routine mentality and practices of the Party of Labor. The question arose: Could it not have been foreseen that, at this critical economic stage engulfing the country, the country’s stability would not be given a quicker breath of life? But how can it be explained that the government of national stability includes only opposition parties and a section selected by the Party of Labor? Could this situation not have been foreseen, at a nearly hopeless economic time caused by the slow steps of the government of national stability, whose decisions are either implemented late or not implemented at all? And peace and order have been lost, because the law-enforcement bodies apparently continue as they did before. Under these circumstances, to save the country from this situation and prevent the return of dictatorship to Albania—since its idols were already preparing themselves in the days when the workers and antidemocrats in the Soviet Union overthrew Gorbachev—it was necessary, vital, for the strongest opposition parties to set aside petty matters and differences in partisan claims and come together once and for all. The Republican Party had raised this concern some time ago. Representatives of the parties met with their counterparts in the Democratic Party. They then spoke with the Social Democratic Party as well. Later, they presented a concrete platform from the Sixth Conference of the General Council, which was accepted by the sister parties. Thus, the initiative was considered worthwhile and interparty talks began on the position these forces would take. But the initiative to unite the major parties in the meetings came from the Democratic Party. Then they also spoke with the Social Democratic Party. Later, they presented a concrete platform from the Sixth Conference of the General Council, which was accepted by the sister parties. Thus, the initiative was considered worthwhile and interparty talks began on the position these forces would take. PETRO DHIMITRI (Continued on page 2)

On August 20, the Supreme Soviet of the USSR voted 283 to 29 to suspend the Communist Party because of its numerous violations during the coup attempt to overthrow President Gorbachev by force. The Supreme Soviet ordered the USSR Prosecutor General’s Office to investigate the Soviet Communist Party’s activities during the coup. This event marks the end of the glory of communism, which claimed that the future belonged to it and that it would reach the highest levels of economic and social development. Fairy tales, gentlemen, fairy tales—ones we have experienced deep in our own bodies, but for which the Socialist Party, supposedly “renewed” for this occasion, bears no responsibility. May it have a clear conscience! ISMET ZANAJ

Yesterday, in one of the halls of the Palace of Congresses, the press and propaganda editor of the PPSH Central Committee held a press conference. The chairman of the PPSH KP Committee and deputy minister of Culture, Youth and Sports, Mr. Agim Zeka, gave an overview of the state of Albanian sport and said that “it has been deeply wounded by events connected with the economic situation, the exodus of athletes, etc.” In response to questions from journalists, the sports officials,

And peace and order have been lost, because the law-enforcement bodies apparently continue as they did before. Under these circumstances, to save the country from this situation and prevent the return of dictatorship to Albania—since its idols were already preparing themselves in the days when the workers and antidemocrats in the Soviet Union overthrew Gorbachev—it was necessary, vital, for the strongest opposition parties to set aside petty matters and differences in partisan claims and come together once and for all. The Republican Party had raised this concern some time ago. Representatives of the parties met with their counterparts in the Democratic Party. They then spoke with the Social Democratic Party as well. Later, they presented a concrete platform from the Sixth Conference of the General Council, which was accepted by the sister parties. Thus, the initiative was considered worthwhile and interparty talks began on the position these forces would take. PETRO DHIMITRI (Continued on page 2)

(Continued on page 2) ABDI BALETA

(Continued on page 2)