Will the respectable “Koha Jonë” be a member of the association you lead? I believe that, despite the different political commitments and aims we have, I at least expect us to reach an understanding on a problem that is not directly connected with politics, nor directly with the many parties around us. To make the problem concrete, please allow me to recall a statement of yours at the meeting we held a short while ago with the German ambassador to Albania. If I am not mistaken, at that very friendly meeting, you enthusiastically declared that: “...in a few days, you would convene the association for an important seminar, where you would work on the JOURNALIST’S CODE OF ETHICS. After the journalists had become familiar with this code, you would make an important decision. Any journalist who violated even one point of this code would be expelled from the association without the slightest hesitation. I want to tell you, dear colleague, that your idea was truly brilliant and worthy of admiration. Once implemented, your association would not only gain further professional standing, but above all you would render an extraordinary service to the Albanian press in general. You would bring this press out, if I may put it plainly, in the blink of an eye, as happens so often in the margins and in fairy tales, from the miserable state into which it has fallen. And by eliminating disinformation, resentment, insults, abuse, immorality, intrigue, treachery, and even journalistic prostitution from newspapers today, you would undoubtedly be rendering this country an invaluable service, one it will not soon forget. Dear colleague! Many days have passed since you announced your idea, and you have surely worked on that CODE OF ETHICS. If you will not misunderstand me, and with the greatest friendliness, I would like to ask you this question: After becoming familiar with the CODE, does the newspaper “Koha Jonë” continue to be a member of the association you lead? At first glance my question seems harsh and looks as though it tramples with both feet on that famous journalist’s code of ethics. Forgive me, dear colleague, but your association’s newspaper “Koha Jonë” leaves one no choice but to ask this kind of question. Let us try to explain ourselves concretely. I believe you have also read the articles in this newspaper, advertised in capital letters on the front page. One of them is titled ‘A young Albanian has oral sex with a 60-year-old woman’ and the other ‘A 17-year-old is not accepted into an Athens brothel because she was missing one breast’. I do not know how you felt when you read these two articles, nor how shocked you were, but I can assure you that I felt great sorrow. I want to tell you that this is not merely shameful. To be a pathological pervert to this extent means being worse than vile. The various tensions of the past three years have also shaped the face of the press today. This press has become inflamed and badly blinded. As you know, disinformation, resentment, insults and other things have become everyday phenomena, and although this phenomenon may seem unavoidable, I have always believed that a day would come when the press, too, would change course. I say this because I have believed in Albanian journalists, in their abilities, and why not in your abilities as a capable commentator, too. But when I saw the prostitution of the newspaper “Koha Jonë”, I was shocked and felt insulted and humiliated. I do not believe you felt otherwise. Brothels will open in Albania too, dear colleague, but rushing to open them in newspapers that call themselves serious is vile. But above all, it is criminal to prostitute your own relative, your own person. Once, journalists who are now part of your association spoke cynically of the newspapers of “former waiter Haxhi Isufi”. Dear Preç, I want to assure you that this Haxhi, a former waiter, has never portrayed the Albanian woman in the newspapers he produces as half-breasted, to the point that Athens brothels would throw her out and prostitute her. This Haxhi, a former waiter, has never written in newspapers about forced oral sex. These things are made public only by your association’s newspaper “Koha Jonë”, or, as we hear it called, “the only independent newspaper in Albania”. Dear colleague! I do not know how far you have got with that journalist’s code of ethics. I can say that if it is truly applied, as you intended, then the Albanian press will be saved once and for all. Finally, once again, please be so kind as to let me ask you: After working on this code, will you keep the brothel “Koha Jonë” in your association? Despite our different political commitments, I cannot imagine that we will fail to reach an understanding on this point. Cordially, YLLI RAKIPI

Berisha meets with the peace mediators “The current proposed solution to bring the Bosnian conflict to an end should be replaced by another that does not reward the aggressor,” President Berisha is quoted as saying by his press office during the meeting he held on Friday in Tirana with the European Community and UN mediators David Owen and Thorvalt Shtoltenberg. After presenting his country’s position, President Berisha insisted that the situation in Kosovo be regarded as a “very important aspect of the Balkan crisis,” emphasizing in particular that dialogue between Belgrade and the “legitimate representatives” of Kosovo, with the mediation of a third party, should be an aim of the European Community, describing it as a modus vivendi for Kosovo. Photo: Armand Babani

Let us all repent together, as if we were singing a TE DEUM in a choir. Let us all consider ourselves guilty and then repent. Let us consider ourselves guilty even when responsibility never fell on us, because if we change ourselves only at the top, climbing up the stairs, we will thereby secure only the abyss of perdition. Therefore, let us repent, because there are so few of us and we know one another by name. We know one another’s misdeeds and betrayals by name, both those of the side that has never committed a misdeed, but by name, and those of the side that has never bowed and whose betrayals we know bowed, never bowed. With head bowed, I sought to find among the sorrowful who are

During the meeting he held at the “Hilton” hotel in Washington with the President of the Republic of Kosovo, Ibrahim Rugova, U.S. President Clinton once again reaffirmed the United States’ commitment to a preventive policy toward Kosovo.

When it comes to the national question and the problems related to resolving it, it would be a mistake to remain within the confines of resolving the problem of the Albanians of Kosovo, which is undoubtedly the most important and delicate for many reasons. To a greater or lesser extent, Albanians, who live in considerable numbers in the countries bordering Albania, face various problems concerning their status in those countries. Despite the differences and various particularities of the Albanian population in different countries, when it comes to resolving the Albanian problem, since there are, in some way, mutual influences, the need arises to develop a global strategy regarding the problem in question. The breakup of the former Yugoslavia and the emergence as an independent state of the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia have brought several very acute problems concerning the status of the Albanians living in Macedonia to the fore. These problems are connected—or, rather, are a product of—the relationship between the number of the Albanian population and the other populations living in the small republic of around two million inhabitants. To date, Skopje’s rulers have responded to the legitimate demands of the Albanians, who make up a considerable part of the population there, by playing the card of their own sorrow as a national minority. Such a tactic is more of an atavism of federal Yugoslavia, where, faced with the relatively large number of the mosaic of nations...

Reportage Gjirokastra — 40,000 inhabitants. The city with the highest share of investment in the Republic: $960 per inhabitant. It is followed by the country’s capital, with $460 per inhabitant, and, at the bottom, the northern districts, with $0 per inhabitant. “We live much better and cannot be compared with the past,” says F. SH, 35, unemployed. This economic situation is due more to (il)legal emigration to Greece than to continued work at the few production enterprises. Eight Greek companies have begun operating in Gjirokastra, with capital of nearly $21 million. After the local elections on July 26, the Socialists won the Municipality, while the district council went to PBDNJ—or, more accurately, to the minorities, who make up around 20% of the district’s population. “Are the Greek minority members discriminated against? I’m the one who is discriminated against: whichever office I knock on, I find only Greeks. And, of course, those Greeks are numerous,” says Flamur, a man who was unable to get a visa at the Greek consulate recently established in Gjirokastra because he does not have a suitable name. Flamur does not blame anyone for his situation. “It’s our own fault; we went and voted for the Greek’s party (the Party for the Protection of Human Rights, my note) for five cents’ worth of clothes. But next time nobody will swallow that olive pit again. Not for clothes and a package—even if they give me a one-year visa, I won’t vote for the Greeks.” “If we are talking about denationalization, it begins in Gjirokastra,” Mehmet Topulli raises his voice in the city hall, at a meeting organized by the branch of the Republican Party on property issues. “The Greek is taking the land, but this matter won’t end there.” The thorns are now becoming apparent in the land distributed under Law 7501. The problem becomes more complicated in areas where Greek companies are seeking to invest. The situation seems calmer on land acquired for agricultural work. Albanian owners are convinced that sooner or later they will get their land back. “The land is there; it isn’t going anywhere. Let us work it and plant it.” The situation in the city is more complicated. The many requests to build on plots encounter resistance from the owners. Even where the construction issue is resolved, the owner’s signature is still required. This phenomenon has spread throughout the country in recent times. Some members of the minority, too, are calling for the land-ownership issue to be settled once and for all, so they can feel secure about the future. Economically strengthened by work in Greece, they prefer to buy the land “as soon as possible” from the “old” owner. This can only be achieved once a law on the sale and purchase of land is passed. But Albanian owners warn of indescribable consequences if such a law is passed without recognizing their fathers’ properties. The owners in the city seem to have their greatest problem with their own property, which is recognized by the Law on the Return and Compensation of Properties, passed by Parliament in May ’93, but is not “recognized” by the construction authorities. Gjirokastra residents find it easier to obtain documents recognizing ownership of plots in Tirana. “Here the bureaucrats act as if they were giving us their own properties,” says an elderly man. “When it comes to property, I’ve made a little party for myself,” says the old man when someone teases him with the label “PS member.” The economic situation is at a satisfactory level in Gjirokastra’s villages, too. “Gyna të qeramh, we are much better off, because nobody takes care of us. The North lives better,” says Balo Basha from Lazarat in Gjirokastra. When they explain to him that in the North there are families who have [unclear] in agricultural work, the situation seems calmer. get their land back. Basha from Lazarat in Gjirokastra. “Gjirokastra — The Steepest City.” seems calmer. in agricultural work, the situation seems calmer. get their land back. “What the Albanian state should do is scatter the Albanians,” says K.T. The issue of ownership is now being discussed throughout the country, but in areas such as Gjirokastra the problem becomes acute. Taking the law into one’s own hands is less common here in property disputes, but “the nervousness people are showing today in this hall [referring to the meeting organized by the district branch of the RP on property issues] is a sign of exhaustion. We have been waiting for this situation to change for a long time,” concludes one person attending the meeting. Because of its architectural layout, Gjirokastra has earned the nickname “the steepest city.” There is no historical danger. It is just that recently the description “the steep city” has been used increasingly often.

I want to speak with Ramiz Alia’s regency member, Kiço Blushi. I want to cry with him over all the living people of this nation, over the troubles surrounding the autumn elections, said the madwoman from Tirana on Friday in front of a large crowd on the steps of the National Historical Museum. After these words, followed by a sizeable crowd (on her account), she walked back and forth many times along the former “Stalin” Boulevard, then headed toward the banks of the artificial lake. On Saturday at 12:00, she climbed the steps of the mosque in the center of the capital and delivered this speech. “Today strange things are happening, which poor people find difficult to understand. The most important observer in Arkan’s elections in Kosovo was journalist Martin Leka. Sources close to the event report that had he not been present, Arkani would not have risked his parliamentary mandate. It is thought that E-tros Butros Gali will resign and Arben Arben Imami will be appointed in his place. Do you know who wants Fatos Nano’s punishment more than anyone else? There are rumors that it is Namiku, i Hoti, but Dokla. This cannot be true, because Namikët are born to be leaders. In Greece, a deputy from the Turkish minority was arrested, while in Albania it is expected that deputies from the Greek minority will arrest the leadership of Parliament. In the autumn elections, all the mad people will vote for the AD parties, taking this party’s figures to 0.81%. Luan Hajdar aga will be PS duty officer for next week.”

Photo: Armand Babani

The development of TELEKOM brings Albania closer to world civilization p. 2 “Am I really living in an aquarium?!” p. 3 Iljaz Pashë Dibra, chairman and leader of the Albanian League of Prizren p. 3 Reply by Fatmir Zanaj p. 2

Which are more… Albanians ahead of the census in Macedonia