Gentlemen Ceka, Imami, Ngjela ARben POPOCI Or perhaps the gentlemen in question are making fools of us. How else are we to understand that, at Serbia’s invitation, as guests of Serbia, at Serbia’s expense, they went together to Belgrade and apparently carried out an “X-ray photograph” of the political situation there and the balance of forces, and were very pleased with many things that, they say, are not all meant to be disclosed. They will take the most valuable findings to the President for him to develop in his foreign policy toward Serbia. Serbia apparently chose them from among a thousand parties and associations to go there and, at Serbia’s expense, render services to the Albanian state. A radical member of the Serbian parliament who had refused to speak with them was called a donkey by Ngjela. But it turns out that he was the wisest one: he understood how dangerous these Albanians were, whom other asses in power had invited to talks, while in reality they were conducting a survey for Serbia, whose information Berisha will use tomorrow to bring Serbia to its knees. The most important thing they had discovered was that all the political forces in Serbia had a unified national policy. “This surprises me,” said Ngjela. He was surprised that the Serbs had a national policy to which everyone adhered and, despite their differences, moved along it; apparently they had made such strong statements before going to Belgrade that they were surprised that no one there trampled on national interests for the sake of party interests. They should have known this even before going to Belgrade. Because that is how it is everywhere in the world, in China and Japan too. It is only not like that in “the Republic Community.” It would be like that in Albania too, were it not for parties such as theirs. not for parties such as theirs. They had not met with high-ranking officials (the Foreign Minister apparently does not count here) because they had not wanted to conduct state policy. The fact that they had been invited by a state institute funded from the state budget does not mean the opposite; it says a great deal. It shows that their trip to Belgrade served the Serbian state and the party in power. The first lesson they ought to have learned in Tirana was that Serbia does not make moves for nothing, or to show Albanians the world. Yet they apparently went there in response to a friendly, harmless invitation. According to them, they used it to make political observations that would be very valuable for Albania in the future. They had met with Drashkoviq and had seen that he had an oppositional stance toward Kosovo. Drashkoviq had seen that they were not so opposed; they had “enchanted” him with their ability to put their position on Kosovo into practice. On the other hand, they had no shortage of words to express their admiration for “Jovanoviq’s professionalism” and that of the others. Why, do you think, had Serbia invited these people for a visit? It is obvious that, first of all, it tried to buy them. If it could not buy them, the gains Serbia has made are now even clearer after the visit. The exposure of the famous “trio” on Serbian television, which was followed by other television stations around the world, will not be commented on by Serbia, hermetically isolated from the “West,” being visited by a Western party and Albanians! Whoever says Serbia is not inclined to dialogue: it has constantly sought dialogue, but the others do not want it. All it takes is to find a willing partner, and there you are. Above all, the message to domestic public opinion is also perfectly clear: Albanians can shout all they want; we kill them in their ethnic territory, and in our state territory too, while we can have dialogue whenever we wish; one phone call is enough. What did the PAD gain? What did Albania gain? As far as Serbia was concerned, the idea of going there was not an Albanian one. This is the main difference between their trip to Belgrade and Bullgarov’s invitation to Tirana. Berisha’s invitation had a purpose, and whether that purpose was achieved can be debated; but in the second case the initiative was Serbian, and they had an objective to accomplish, which they apparently accomplished. As a party, the PAD gained negative points.

ISMAIL KADARE Beyond [the text begins mid-sentence] and more often, they dreamed of only one thing: to have a song raised for them. A song they could hear when evening fell over the mountain and there were clouds in the sky. But so many years had passed, and no one was raising a song for him. Perhaps songs were for the living too. Perhaps no one would raise a song for me, he thought, growing more and more troubled each day. One day, in the bazaar of a distant city, he killed a man right in the middle of a café. This man came from a wealthy family, and he himself was a man [the source text is garbled here]...

Five dead Albanians have been found at the Greek border The bodies were located in the area of the Greek border village of Kalovris, near the town of Konica, ANA reports This act follows the mistreatment and mass deportations inflicted on Albanian refugees in Greece

Regarding the visit to Belgrade by the group from the marginal Democratic Alliance of Albanians, President Rugova said that the visit was a complete failure for this party. This party has no right to speak on behalf of Kosovo, wherever it may be, for low political aims and motives. Decisions about Kosovo are made by its legitimate representatives and the people of Kosovo, and no one has the right, in the name of this political goal and for low motives, to attribute to Albanian political parties in the former Yugoslavia that they oppose peaceful policy and dialogue. “We have made efforts to initiate dialogue with the Serbian side,” President Rugova continued, “and also with the Serbian opposition, but without success. We tried this through international mediators, within the framework of the Geneva Conference and the special group for Kosovo, on certain issues. Our public and the international public know this very well, but without success,” while Dr Rugova [the source text is incomplete/garbled here]. “So the DA has, rather, destroyed itself than the Kosovo issue.”

Athens has enough water for only one month after a prolonged autumn that has forced the government to consider emergency measures and the Orthodox Church to call on the faithful to pray for rain. “This is the worst drought in a century. If it does not rain, Athens may have no water within a month,” Reuters’ Jani Pedis, head of public relations at the water company EYDAP, said.

At the Ministry of Defence On Friday, in Minister Zhulali’s office, a Memorandum of Understanding and Cooperation was signed between the Ministry of Defence of the Republic of Albania and the Ministry of Defence of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Lord Robert Cranborne, Minister of State at the British Ministry of Defence, signed on behalf of the British side. “This is an extremely important agreement for the situation in the Balkans,” Minister Zhulali commented after the signing. Among other things, Lord Cranborne said, “I am pleased to see that there is a shared desire for cooperation. We will proceed and continue further with such constructive relations.” Also present were the Chief of the General Staff, Ilia Vasho, the British consul in Tirana, Stephen Nash, and military officials from both sides. The signed agreement provides for a cooperation plan with NATO, opportunities for visits, an exchange of views and experience, as well as visits by military students.

More and more often, he dreamed of only one thing: that someone would make up a song about him. A song he could hear when evening fell on the mountain, and that would continue until the morning. making up a song about him. Surely no one, ever, would make up a song about me? he thought, although he was still young and had much of his life ahead of him. The dream of a song had come to him several years earlier, as he travelled alone one autumn through the mountains, heading for his hut. On all four horizons, the mountains rose to a frightening height and, walking alone like that, with his rifle over his shoulder, he began to feel small beneath the dark weight of the great mountains. Just then, feeling his spirit crushed by his own weakness, he heard a song somewhere in the distance. A drawn-out, plaintive voice, a song of bravery, somewhere in a hut swallowed by darkness. The wind kept changing the direction of the voice, and he could not make out what the song was singing; then it slowly faded and remained far away, behind the mountains, more elusive and more distant than the mountains themselves. And again his great dream was born: to hear his name sung in a song, in a glorious, stirring song, in the light and darkness of night. Years had passed, and he was still without a song. It was true that new songs in the village were very rare, but from time to time they did compose some, just as there were songs about the living, too. Surely no one would make up a song about me, he thought, growing gloomier by the day. One day, in the bazaar of a distant town, café. The man was from a family with whom his clan had been in a blood feud for years. It was not his turn to avenge the blood, because he was not the eldest and was the most distant relative of the man who had been killed, the last one between the two families. Nevertheless, he risked his life and killed the blood enemy right in the middle of a café in a distant town. But even after that, no one made up a song about him. On dark evenings he waited in vain to hear his song. The evenings came and went, cold, dark and mute. No one, ever? he thought, pale-faced, watching his exhausted fellow villagers return in the evenings, carrying a sack of corn on their backs from faraway places. So, never anyone at all. “A song costs dearly,” an old man from his hut had told him one day. “Don’t yearn for a song, boy; a song demands a life.” I can’t believe it, he had said to himself. A song costs so much? But even if that is so… One night he abducted a girl from another bajrak and married her. He did not love the girl, but abducted her so that his name would be heard everywhere. But the weeks and months of winter passed, with snow and wind, and he did not sing during the day with his new wife, who had understood that he did not love her; and still, there was no song about him. In all the newspapers published in Albania before 1990, notwithstanding the supposed persecution by mass organizations and so on, they were in fact newspapers rich in power. This one had even more. It is enough to leaf through their newspapers, to see the magazines “Përparimi” and others, right through to the end of 1990. “Zëri Popullit” and, finally, the PP, to show current organizational measures, steps and other facts; its regularly published newspapers were more than sufficient. In this history of the Albanian press, [??] were not absent from “Përparimi” and the other magazines; they continued for a long time with a newspaper of HYP [??]. In their popular daily press, the newspapers published in [??], which at that time turned into a mass [??] of the press of [??]

— The press is a difficult game, entered in order to gain dignity, not money. — Marash Mirashi Today’s newspapers. Yet, despite this, many newspapers began to be published in Albania later on. Today, the number of newspapers published amounts to roughly one newspaper for every 4,000 inhabitants. New newspapers are also expected to open. This is perhaps proof of a force, and even more of a newspaper, showing that the democratic system has opened the way for the press. After all this, a question: How many of the newspapers published today are independent—or, in other words, does an independent press exist in Albania? We will not mention all the newspapers in our view, since we understand that there are a thousand of them, but I want to emphasize that the independence of all the newspapers published in the country today is either real or in the process of being established; regardless of whether they are independent, the newspapers they publish are newspapers that always have all those newspapers? [??]. Some may object to this, but the truth is that a newspaper is not made independent by the label “independent,” which is still commonly used, but by its content. And there are many such newspapers, both in the districts and in the capital. Commercialism is their alpha. Thus, if the commercial newspaper “ZP” were judged by its name, it would be a [??], but in reality its content confirms the distortion. This is quite clear! But the journalists of the press also have a problem: let us suppose that x newspaper is independent. We take one that looks like two drops of water like a political newspaper. We conclude that the newspaper ZP has some accurate items that it brings out regularly. Despite this, the newspaper is called independent today. It is said—and this is confirmed by the newspaper’s masthead—that it is the most independent press? If these newspapers are the most [??] and fair, despite ...

The monthly inflation rate for the territory of fragmented Yugoslavia will exceed 2,000 percent, a Yugoslav government expert noted. Dragutin Grupkovic, head of the Federal Bureau of Statistics, said that this rate would be higher than the previous monthly rate of 1,880.6 percent in August, the Yugoslav news agency Tanjug reported. Such an inflation rate would set a world monthly record since the Second World War, he said. The Federal Government noted that “Yugoslavia has no chance of stopping inflation while the country is suffering under economic sanctions.”

A large number of newspapers in Albania are extremely opposition-minded. Just read their articles, if you have the patience. The question arises: is this precisely the phenomenon that ensures the independence of newspapers? An independent newspaper is not a satellite. It does not take sides, but is based solely on facts. But, forgive me, why does the fact that Albania has developed and opened up over these two years find no space in our independent newspapers? They not only fail to acknowledge the true basis of their independence, but also conceal the picture, it seems. This is another little nostalgia of the newspaper. No one would say anything bad if some newspapers replaced the label “independent” with the slogan “organ or satellite of ZP,” or simply “opposition newspaper.” I do not want to offend anyone, since I am a journalist myself, but it would be good if people with no connection whatsoever to journalism gave up the press and, instead of working as journalists, did something else—some useful work that makes use of their professions. In concluding these lines, I hope that one day there will also be a press in Albania that is independent of the parties. The time has come.

The draft law “On the recognition and return of ownership of land and, in special cases, compensation for it in kind,” submitted by the Presidium of the National Association of the Expropriated “Ownership with Justice”

On the occasion of the publication of the first issue of the newspaper “REPORTER,” owned by the journalism students of the University of Tirana, the editorial staff of “REPUBLIKA” welcomes the journalism students’ initiative to set an example of informative and independent journalism.

The madwoman N, tired of being compelled to appear in public—not only out of pathological need, but, let us say, also as a social service to all those who fear the truth—solved these problems. “In a newspaper that respects the people even in its headline, a former journalist, a little more [??] than me, has let fly with an article attacking a colleague, as he once did with letters and the characteristics he signed with a sickle and hammer. What I like most is that the author of the piece now represents the victim with the same affection as if he had praised him. This shows that life is proceeding normally, while Zyliatar Ramizi set off on a winter holiday to a cell where he once demonstrated professional skill through fists and iron logic, as well as the culture of the century—a culture borrowed from contemporary literature on torture belonging to the second years and our new era. Arapi Mimo will sing a song of bravery, ‘Lela o lele, the hare has torn us apart.’ Meanwhile, it is quite clear what kind of dairy produce the old man has, having changed places according to culture. Citizens who listen to me with such patience and respect, I urge you to continue believing me and to maintain your vigilance as in the time of ‘Dull Tulla,’ because some people are trying to get involved in political life who think that, because they are clean and capable, they ought to be taken into consideration—perhaps even helped. What is this, then! Do you know what it means to be clean and to have caused a lot of trouble? To spend your whole life with two dossiers and spy just once on Juzek—good for you! And then ‘Dull Tulla’ gave you the chance; why did you betray him and end up being called an honest man? The trade of spying is not learned in old age, especially since there are no courses now. As for the problem of those who went to Belgrade, history will satisfy the curiosity of those interested with the real version of their visit there. In confidence, I tell you that ‘They’ did not go to Belgrade; their doubles went. That is how they fool the Serbs and the local political parties. In any case, the most credible version is that they are the ‘Trojan Horse’ and that, one night, when you have a square, they will get up and do whatever is done at night, those [??]. So those connected with Akacasi come in useful too, since it has been learned that this Trojan business is a maneuver. Schools should be opened in Troy in the amateur or [??] language; we’ll frighten the [??] of Lumtur Roheln, who does not enter the [??]. THE CHRONICLER