Konstantin Micotaqis, a relic of the Cold War, seeks to colonize Albania In diplomatic circles in Tirana and Brussels, there was a strong sense of relief after the diplomatic steps toward dialogue taken by Albania toward Greece, and they recognized Greece’s serious mistake concerning the European [Community] and the Albanian leadership. But their disappointment was even greater at the medieval bearers of [unclear] from Athens, in the Greek prime minister Micotaqis’s belligerent declarations. That Athens is seeking and deliberately creating tensions in its relations with Albania and in the southern Balkans is no longer in doubt for serious diplomats and analysts who follow the Balkans. The question is where Greece will end up with these provocations, now openly directed at Albania, Europe, and the USA. On 14 July, the Greek prime minister, who confused the day of the month with the year, issued one of the most absurd ultimatums in the history of ultimatums from the Cold War and its aftermath. The Greek prime minister openly and unequivocally declared the aim of his political platform: to activate and extend his influence throughout Albania, through political and military means. In this atmosphere, together with threats and ultimatums, a program of Greek tutelage over Albania was announced. He declared southern Albania to be Greek land and, naturally, coupled it with the corresponding claim, invoking intermediaries and Homer. As for Homer and the great thinkers of ancient Greece, Epirus was never Hellenic; the writers of the Greek prime minister’s banners would do well to read Thucydides, Herodotus, Strabo, and others once again. Why the prime minister has chosen to speak the language of fascist Northern Epirote propaganda is his own business, but we have the right to remind the man who heads the Greek government that Albanian lands, in the north and in the south, belong to Albania. If Greeks were generously proclaimed welcome at the beginning of the last century to work the lands of Albanian owners, that was a sign of magnanimity, some writers would say, or of historical error, some analysts would say. Nevertheless, since the person claiming these Albanian lands is the prime minister of a neighboring state and, naturally, cannot be brought under Albanian law, we have the right to remind him that Albanian lands will never again be touched by those who live in nostalgia for the Balkan criminals of 1913 and 1914. For the first time in a public forum, Prime Minister Micotaqis presents one of the basic points of the Greek annexationist program against Albania: the colonization of southern Albania with Greek colonists. With a plan that will be sold to whoever likes it, with whoever is a condition of that agreement; and, second, what we need first and foremost is differentiation, not unification—the differentiation of the national from the non-national. This differentiation is not taking place precisely because the vital national interest has not been defined, and the Republic’s government should do so. On claims against the occupier, he says that using the word “occupation” is good from a propaganda standpoint but bad morally; however, he does not explain whether it is better to be more accurate than to engage in propaganda. He says the political parties in power are to blame for this expression, and once again falls into the role of an oppositionist. This becomes immediately apparent in the next question, about whether he is the bleating of an Albanian [unclear] against Serbian policy; he simply has no answer to this question. He calls for “movements” that make propaganda, which invites much comment. As for “Tirana’s [unclear] policy toward Kosovo,” he concludes that Tirana has no settled position on Kosovo. The medieval Byzantine diplomacy of Athens responds to Tirana’s European and civilized diplomacy.

FATOS ARAPI The human eye has a wonderful ability to adapt: it learns to see even in the dark. Now it is not difficult to see, beyond the smoke that Greek diplomacy releases from time to time, that the sharpest issue is the problem of minorities in Greece. This country, the “first homeland of democrats,” recognizes neither the Turkish minority nor the Albanian minority (the Cham). Put briefly, this means that today’s Greece, in reality, neither recognizes nor respects people’s fundamental rights. To conceal this distortion in the body of contemporary Greek society, government and ultranationalist circles seize the banner of human rights and the protection of the rights of Greek minorities in neighboring countries, thus presenting themselves to world opinion as champions of European democracy. This banner is often waved at Albania. The beautiful colors of this government-ultranationalist banner shine in the eyes of world opinion, as if its bearers were champions of democracy and justice. This banner is often waved at Albania. The beautiful colors of this government-ultranationalist banner shine in the eyes of many people who have previously been manipulated by Greek propaganda. Relations between states are established on the basis of permanent and temporary interests. It is “natural” that Albania needs relations of its own kind, sincere and stable, with Greece. Albania wants its southern borders secure and inviolable; it has vital interests in reciprocal economic relations. Albania is convinced that it has much to learn from Greek culture and art; Albanians would like, beyond Albanian territory, to experience the beautiful, peaceful, unique space of the neighboring Greek world. But Albania alone [unclear]. Greece, too, has mutual interests in seeing normal relations between the two countries. A strong, independent Albania would guarantee it a peaceful northern border; moreover, a strong and economically developed Albania would provide the Greek people with more than a peaceful border—it would give them a friendship and support such as that symbolized by the Bosknet and Xhavelajt [unclear]. The enduring Albanian-Greek economic relations would ensure the flourishing of the northern, mountainous regions of Greece, which cannot breathe without opening up to Albania. A strong and developed Albania is a highly advantageous space for Greece; under other circumstances, that is, through contact with other Balkan states (even “friendly Serbia”), other routes would open to Greece. Let the Greek people [unclear] for 10 years, and Çamëria will show [unclear]. Not only Albania but Greece, too, has very important interests in the normal development of relations between the two countries. Whether these interests remain clear or expand into strategic development interests will depend on the wisdom of the two diplomatic services. Albania is a Balkan country, but Albania is not only a Balkan country. Albania is continuously and directly in Europe, at the western [unclear] of the Balkans. Albania is a Mediterranean Balkan country par excellence, and to imagine that the only doors through which Albania can enter Europe are through Greece is, among many other things, evidence of the dark minds of government officials, who see a threat to the world in a crumb of bread caught between their teeth. Greek diplomacy in its relations with Albania must no longer rely either on declarations or on its arrogance. The time has come when the Albanian people can no longer tolerate—nor should the Albanian government or certain circles—the fear and inertia on this front. We sincerely hope, from the heart, that the Greek people too, and especially the minority in Albania, will understand the general truth that the card of Northern Epirus must no longer conceal relations between our two peoples, nor continue to serve as an election-campaign card. The problem of Albanian economic migration to Greece is for the Albanian government to resolve. It can find the solutions itself, the government, if it is a government; but it [continues on page 4]

From Mr. SABRI GODO’s speech at the meeting with the citizens of Fier No prospect is visible for emerging from this very prolonged crisis. I will mention once again our assessments of the key problems. Democracy requires the presence of opposition and pluralism. There is an opposition in our Parliament, but hostility has reached such levels that it rules out constructive dialogue. This applies with equal force to the country’s political life. The Democratic Party, as the winning party, chose to govern the country by imposing its own concepts and through hostility using its own forces. This was made necessary by the social-communists across from it, but it was a mistake to continue sidelining other forces that are now part of this democracy and, especially, the country’s intellectual potential. Self-isolation and the desire for an absolute monopoly, fed by extremism within this party, continued to grow. I believe that all the mistakes and inadequate governance that are keeping the country in a closed circle stem from such a development. The government is criticized from various quarters for lacking an economic program. The government does not answer the criticism, which is supported by facts and corresponds to the plans of international financial institutions. By elevating the program of a single party, the government eliminates the principle of coalition. This is not a coalition, although the government has recruited a number of ministers from other parties. In fact, the government has never separated itself from these parties. It has been built on several criteria that obstruct inter-institutional functioning. Finance and the economy, by their very nature, are “oppositional dictators,” yet they were placed under a single hand. Decisions in government pass without opposition. Some ministers prove incompetent, but remain in office for party-political reasons. Hand on heart, I say that I look at the cabinet of ministers from the outside. I see it without a clear program, with a narrowed political base, with an approach unsuited to the transition, and with a weak quality of membership. This is a serious concern. Governance has always been citizens’ first concern, because it concerns the fate of each person and of all of us together. The lack of an economic program led to the closure of enterprises and to unbearable unemployment. We import all sorts of goods that we exported for years. This has not happened in any of the countries of the East. It is happening here because of gross incompetence, or because corruption has become the country’s most threatening path. The Democratic Party’s desire to govern alone has been accompanied by arbitrary methods in removing powers from local government and by purges in the administration. For some time we have been asking: can the government in Tirana solve, through its directors, the problems of the village and the commune? The indicators are not very positive. Goods are piling up for new traders, and some face bankruptcy. The Ministry of Finance may know its work better, but citizens also know that people cannot buy what they do not have, even when prices fall. The Ministry of Finance is not giving the country a clear picture of what happens to the taxes collected in the city. The government has announced that it will restore order. Could the Minister of Public Order once again publish his bulletin of the crimes and accidents that occur every day in Albania? A citizen pays part of everything he has to protect the rest, as well as his life. In other words, he pays taxes for order. So is the police anything other than a guard? We understand the hierarchy. Many of them believe they are in positions of authority so they can exercise power over the people, using the rubber baton inappropriately. People have begun to fear the police and the organizations behind it. This is not healthy for democracy. The government talks about corruption. On this point, the government should look to itself. A citizen cannot take a bribe because he has nothing in his hands. The work is in the hands of the minister, his deputy, and so on down to the civil registrar. Stop shouting about corruption from the office. The work [is to ensure] that government serves only its own interests, the ministries and state administration, through purges and the appointment of connected people, and [to establish] modern accounting at every level. The Albanian Republican Party’s January 1991 program stated that an employee who takes bribes must be dismissed immediately. [There must be] accountability for state employees. Everyone must work and denounce this terrible evil openly, but for the public to do this, it must be provided with [the means—text cuts off]

Rexhep Qosja, intellectual or politician ARJEN POPOÇI Exer Hoxha made his statement when all Kosovo had already grasped who he was; the same was done with the other matters, specifically in the intervention and the newspaper “Albania.” Here too he speaks from the position of an opposition politician and offers no alternative option on any matter for objectively assessing the criticism. He criticizes criticism and gives no proposal. Let us take things in order: regarding the politicians and supporters who are in the opposition. Of course, we cannot have political support when we have no concrete support program. But a national program is not created only in San Berinse. The Yugoslavs or Fatos Nano are supported by Rexhep Qosja in his political thinking. His Serbian counterpart, Dobica Qosiq, has not wasted time criticizing and building his own myth; instead, he made the Memorandum for Greater Serbia. He says, for example, that recognizing Macedonia was a mistake. Well, it may have been a mistake, but in the absence of any concrete political thinking from our intellectuals who stand with Qosja, politicians acted as best they knew how. And it is not too late now: if Macedonia was recognized, it can also be “unrecognized,” but let Qosja tell us what comes next, because simply doing nothing, with no political action, does not help Albanians there. He calls for an all-encompassing policy and says it can be achieved through an Assembly for National Reconciliation and Unity. First, such an assembly cannot be held without a platform setting out who agrees, with whom, and what the conditions of that agreement are; second, what we need first is differentiation, not unification—the differentiation of the national from the non-national. This differentiation is not taking place precisely because the vital national interest has not been defined, and the Republic’s government should do so. Regarding claims about the occupier, he says that using the word “occupation” is good from a propaganda standpoint but bad morally; however, he does not explain whether it is better to be more accurate rather than make propaganda. He says the political parties in power are to blame for this expression and once again falls into the role of an oppositionist. This becomes immediately apparent in the next question, whether he is the bleating of an Albanian [unclear] against Serbian policy; he simply has no answer to this question. He calls for “movements” that make propaganda, which invites much comment. As for “Tirana’s [unclear] policy toward Kosovo,” he concludes that Tirana has no settled position on Kosovo.

LORD CARRINGTON: I believe that an extension of the conflict to Kosovo can be avoided. Words, pressures, a leader fully convinced that Albania, as it seems to me, has understood the importance of this Province... Therefore, the UN and the Community must act now in such a way that human rights are respected in Kosovo. “FIGARO,” July 1993

OF THE ALBANIAN REPUBLICAN PARTY Albanian-Greek relations took a new turn with Prime Minister Micotaqis’s declaration of 14 July 1993. The Republican Party considers the six points of this declaration to be a chauvinist diktat and an open interference in Albania’s internal affairs. The declaration says that in 1913 Northern Epirus was annexed to Albania; it places Albanians living in their own lands in the former Yugoslavia on the same plane as the Greek minority; it demands that minority rights be extended in practice to the entire territory of Albania; and it makes other claims of this kind that could not be made by a government with even a modicum of respect for good-neighborliness and for the historical reality of present-day Albanian-Greek relations. Mr. Micotaqis’s declaration contains threats and calls for open hostility, while covering this with routine diplomatic phrases. There is no doubt that it seeks to chill Albania’s language in order to continue the political struggle for the Hellenization of the south, linked to the dangerous policy of destabilization in the Balkans. We support President Sali Berisha’s declaration of 15 July 1993 and call on Parliament, the Government, and all the country’s political forces to denounce this adventurist direction of official Greek policy, making it clear that Albanians, wherever they are, will act united in defense of our national rights and our dignity as a free people. At the same time, our government must not lack the will to seek, once again, open and sincere dialogue on a fully equal basis with the Greek government.

[He] openly and unequivocally declared Greece’s political platform: to activate and extend its influence throughout Albania, through political and military means. These measures are part of a policy aimed at changing the political class in Albania, which does not suit [them]. This is information from all the diplomatic circles here, constrained by Greek policies in Athens and Tirana, which have seen nothing except [an effort] to take their place. Or perhaps the position—the signing of dates—presents a lesson and a certain policy toward the neighbor. Why did Micotaqis specify the year 1913? First, it means that the prime minister of the neighboring state, with which we have had diplomatic relations since the time of the dictatorship of the black colonels in Athens and the colonels in Tirana during the Cold War, is not in Tirana; [they] are unknown and do not recognize not only the date, but also the representation of the Albanian state. Why does Micotaqis mention 1913? Because it was the year when Albanian towns and villages, from Janina to Përmet, from Saranda to Gjirokastër and beyond, were occupied by Greek troops, who massacred Albanian men, women, adults, and elderly people. Thus, the prime minister of a neighboring state seeks to legitimize the situation in which Albania and all its lands were under Greek rule. We also recall that hundreds of thousands of Albanians were expelled from Greece at the end of the Second World War because of their alleged collaboration with the Germans, a collaboration that was not true. Many Albanians from Çamëria were driven from their lands by Cham gangs? (text unclear)

On Monday morning the madwoman N. was seen leaving the civil registry office in Tirana with a paper in her hand. The many curious onlookers who gathered expected her to give one of her usual speeches, but this time the madwoman N. contented herself with saying: “I will no longer be called madwoman N., but madwoman M. My name is no longer Nimete, but Marika.” The madwoman N. repeated these words several times, and those present said that this time her health really was in a bad state. On Tuesday and Wednesday she was nowhere to be seen, nor did she appear at all in this feature of the capital. Refugees returning from Athens said that madwoman N. had been seen wandering around Onom Square. This unexpected trip reflects her desire to change her name, Sidogofte, and in the morning she appeared once again in the capital, shouting: “I’m back, I’m back, I legalized the passport, Haxhinë, Zylyftarin, Pobratin...” Suddenly she stopped her speech and stared at the crowd: “Wait, don’t go away! I don’t remember them all, but I have accurate lists. Don’t worry. My lists are accurate, very accurate, just right! Ah! You people at the front of the line, from the black bag you are taking out only the newspapers ‘Koha Jonë,’ ‘Aleanca,’ ‘ZP.’ “What are these newspapers being published in Albania? They’re ruining the whole thing. What do they have against Greece, that they insult it? Why don’t they say one good word about Greece? Why don’t they publish the statements of the Greek government spokesman, of the Greek Church? Why do they publish only statements by the Albanian government? This does not serve our two friendly peoples. Why, are we going to Europe with nationalism?! What is this national spirit! Why these newspapers...” The Chronicler

As part of its assistance to the Albanian Police, the government of the Federal Republic has sent 40 “MUZ 251 SA” motorcycles, including equipment for motorcyclists.