Meeting of Mr. Sabri GODO in Zall-Herr On 24 May, Mr. Sabri Godo, accompanied by Mr. Maksim Haviari, former commune chairman, and Halim Haga, candidate for commune chairman, met with the villagers of Zall-Herr. Mr. Godo said that a fierce struggle was under way between the parties. These elections are seen as an important test of the place each party currently holds among the electorate. They all claim to be ahead. That cannot be the case for all of them. Such is the nature of election campaigns, and that is why they are somewhat enjoyable, provided the laws are respected and people are chosen with fairness and honesty. The communes where elections are being held are fortunate. We are bewildered by teams of ministers, with trucks and bulldozers. Roads are being paved; foam mattresses and sacks of flour are being handed out. But this could encourage neighboring communities to enter the elections too. And what would happen if elections were held simultaneously in all 340 communes of Albania? Mr. Godo said he was pleased to speak with the people of Zall-Herr, people who listen courteously, even when they do not like what you say. In the past, the people of Zall-Herr were called Ballists; then someone called them Communists. Let us see what they will be called on June 1. One thing is certain: they are people of Zall-Herr, and it is good that you say all the parties have put forward worthy candidates. Then you can choose among them the candidate who is 2 percent better than the others, each on his own land and property [?]. Whoever has built a house on someone else's land will have the house and plot as his own, and the owner will be compensated in full; the newcomer may use the agricultural land for three years, or five years, according to the law Parliament will establish. A title deed can be obtained only for land inherited before the communist regime. No one opposes this kind of right, which also provides for limiting the holdings of former large landowners to 60 ha, provided it is explained to them. Mr. Godo said that the future of Zall-Herr and of the Albanian village as a whole does not lie in remaining rooted in place. Enverist communism did that, seeking to keep the rural population untouched, under the slogan “let us make the village like the city,” which is the same as the other slogan, “let us climb the mountains...” Whatever the parties say and whatever the Government does, Zall-Herr will follow the same path as the European village: it will move in ever greater numbers toward the cities, where jobs will open up. Today there is severe unemployment in the cities themselves, but services, construction and industry will expand there, provided private banks are allowed, privatization is carried out properly, and the legal framework is completed, without which no normal economy can develop. Mr. Godo said that ... …called Ballists; then someone called them Communists. Let’s thing is true: Zall-Herr is a real mess, others. Mr Godo said that for four days he had been going to Zall-Herr, which has good prospects for progress if an honest and active municipal administration is secured and receives the necessary support. The Republican Party does not have the means to perform election miracles in a municipality burdened with so many problems. But if Mr Halim Taga wins, the Republican Party, having no other municipalities apart from the difficult Kurvelesh, will establish a strong presence in Zall-Herr. Mr Godo answered the many friendly questions, especially those concerning the Republican programme on property. Others, particularly the Socialists, have spread lies that the Republicans will demolish the homes of people who built them on someone else’s land in order to restore the estates to the landlords. The Communists still call lawful owners landlords, latifundists, and some even kulaks. The Republican programme, however, can be summed up in a few words as follows: … in the cities themselves, services, construction and industry will be expanded there, but only once private banks are permitted, privatization is properly and fully carried out, and the legal framework is completed, without which the economy cannot develop and we cannot have a normal life. Mr Godo said that we must respect the electoral law and the free vote fanatically if we want true democracy. The first, wholly unacceptable violation is being confirmed in Zall-Herr. The voter lists, including those for military units, which should have been published 15 days before the election, have still not been published, and only five days remain before voting day. He warned the district administration and anyone planning to engage in manoeuvres that he would make an open and resolute complaint to every authority over every violation. Some lies and other tricks may be tolerated, because bringing democracy and its sanctity into complete harmony is difficult, but violations of the right to a free vote cannot be allowed, because it is the golden key to everything. Other questions were also asked at a meeting that was lively and cultured.

While waiting to learn Albanian, the imported primate of the Albanian Orthodox Church is teaching Greek to all the clergy he has appointed in southern Albania. This is the most blatant result achieved by Archbishop Janullatos in the Hellenization of the Albanian Autocephalous Orthodox Church. The subtler results of this activity are revealed by the Greek state powers that the Church leader has granted to his subordinates. Thus, the Governing Council of the Religious Commission of the Sarandë district, chaired by Niko Papanikola, issues authorizations in writing, in Greek, that serve as legal state documents in Greece. Together with Omonia and the Sillogu i Vorioepirit in Corfu, it constitutes three Greek state institutions authorized to issue all kinds of certificates for Albanians from southern Albania. Without wishing to burden Mr. Janullatos with commentary, we are presenting a photocopy of one of these documents, which concerns an Albanian well known in Vlora for managing ball games and who comes from Zvernec in Vlora, the birthplace of one of the founders of the Albanian Autocephalous Orthodox Church. Mr. Janullatos is now kindly asked to tell us whether his subordinates in the South are authorized by him or by Athens to carry out this anti-state activity; whether the Church’s powers in the village [?] are exercised within the framework of the Greek state, where Church and State are not separate, or within the powers of his Church in Albania, which seeks the separation of the South from the Albanian state; and, finally, to confess to us, as before Christ, whether such documents—which ultimately present the structures of his Church in Albania as an integral part of the Greek state—have been issued only by his subordinates in the South or by him as well. While awaiting his confession, we will try to polish even further the sincerity of any answer he may give. This is a great duty of ours toward Albanian Orthodox believers, who have no way of reading in Greek the documents that Janullatos’s Church presents against the sovereignty of their homeland. They are devoted to their faith in God, with whom they expect to communicate in their own language. Mr. Janullatos may teach Greek by various means to dozens of clerics, but not to hundreds of thousands of Albanians. The draft law submitted by the Republican Party has not yet been brought to the attention of Parliament. Certificate: Republic of Albania, Metropolis of Gjirokastër The Religious Commission of the Sarandë District hereby certifies, under its responsibility, that the villages of Nartë and Zvërnec in the district of Vlora are Greek villages and that their inhabitants are Greek-speaking, of Greek origin, Greek-speaking, and of the Orthodox Christian faith. The Albanian state, just as it did with Himara, has registered them as Albanian by nationality... Therefore, Petrit Stefa, born in Vlora and of Zvërnec origin... is of Greek nationality and origin.

[Text and italic writing in the photocopied document, mostly illegible.]

On 23 December 1993, pursuant to Article 22 of the Constitutional Package, on behalf of the RP I submitted and registered with the Parliament secretariat the draft law “On the return of ownership of agricultural land.” From that day until today, this draft law has not been sent to Parliament for discussion; it has not even been mentioned or scheduled. I hope this procedural violation was not intentional. Dr. Mehmet ÇELIKU, RP deputy The editorial office will contact Deputy Çeliku and the Presidium of Parliament about this issue in upcoming editions.

A new draft law could change the situation “The solution to the problem of young people evading compulsory military service may well be found in the draft law recently submitted to the government,” says the head of the military department of the Tirana district, Lieutenant Colonel Bajram Kanani. Military department employees encountered this problem as soon as the exoduses began. At present, they are working under the law “On military service in the armed forces,” which came into force on 1 January 1992. Failure to report is punishable by a fine of 1,000–5,000 lekë. A fine is not producing results. The enforcement offices are not collecting the fines; indeed, they seem to have no interest in doing so. The other, more severe measure—the opening of criminal proceedings—is not being implemented because the Prosecutor’s Office is somewhat reluctant to initiate such cases, Mr. Kanani says. Under the law, when a court convicts a citizen, it must notify the military department within 10 days. The same applies when a citizen is released. But this mechanism is not working. Another problem is the notification system. In the communes, this task has so far been carried out by village elders, but it cannot continue on a voluntary basis like this. Nevertheless, this problem concerns only 15% of young people, and that figure is continually decreasing, Mr. Kanani says.

I know a man who began to suffer from the moment I came into this world. But this is not my fault. What tortures has the man I know so well not endured: humiliation, insults, indifference, loneliness, the struggle to earn his daily bread, the struggle to preserve his dignity. In 1967 he was sent to Vau i Dejës for five years of re-education because, together with distinguished intellectuals such as Selman Riza, etc., he criticized the bureaucratic system led from above at the Institute of Albanian History and Literature. At the hydroelectric plant he worked as a drilling worker, and in the meantime he was deprived of the right to publish and write. In 1973–1974, just after he had returned to his people, they attacked him again—as someone already marked—fired him, turned his books into cardboard, and left him without any kind of work for three years. Then, instead of getting better, he fell seriously ill, but they would not let him be admitted to hospital and treated; since then, he has been completely blind in one eye and has only 30% of the sight in the other eye that remains. And in these conditions, so difficult, painful and dramatic, all his friends and fellow writers abandoned him. No one came to his home anymore, except to knock on his door and tell him that he had to leave Tirana within three days. Nevertheless, he believes deeply in people, and that is what enabled him to survive: faith in humanity and his pen. That is why he wrote and knocked on the doors of the offices of his former friends: “Give me any kind of work, help me—workman, porter. I have no way to make a living, I have no money to buy my only child schoolbooks and shoes; I sold all the things in the house!” At one point they assigned him as a porter at the Polygraphic Combine. Whenever he went to the Writers’ Union, someone would come out to meet him at that gate with its bars, like a prison, and say: “How dare you come through this gate, so high up!” And he would return home crushed and utterly wounded. I often told him: “Don’t go there. You see that Petro Marko never shines there!” But he trusted people, and in fact there are good people in the world too. The man I know is an intellectual and has never sold his pen or his honor, even when they invited him to work for the State Security Service. And all this ministry, which tried to… ‘I will tell you about it as…’ (Continued on page 4)

In Sarandë, King Zog is said to have given a plot of land to a Romanian citizen The most extreme case has emerged among the many claims by former owners seeking the restoration of their rights to land. This time, surprisingly, the claimant is foreign. The Romanian Embassy in Tirana is seeking recognition of its ownership of a plot of land by the sea in the city of Sarandë, claiming that King Zog gave it to a Romanian citizen. The whole story began a year ago, when the Romanian Embassy asked the National Privatization Agency to annul a decision by the Sarandë branch of that agency to sell a citizen a nearly derelict building on a plot of land measuring 750 square metres. The Romanian Embassy’s claims are based on a deed of gift issued in 1932—when King Zog was ruling—which purportedly shows that, as a token of gratitude, he gave a 750-square-metre plot to the Romanian citizen Nikolla Jorga, a distinguished Albanologist and professor at the University of Bucharest, who at the time was also Prime Minister of Romania. At that time, this land was registered in the land registry as state property. Later, by a special decree, a further 17 square metres were added to the plot. In 1934, Nikolla Jorga donated the above-mentioned plot to the Romanian state so that a Romanian Institute of Archaeological Studies could be established there. The Institute was created by decree in 1938, and funds for the construction of the building were also allocated. Today, Llambro Nesturi, 60, a political prisoner for 10 years, has bought this building in accordance with legal procedures. For more than two years he has been the lawful owner of this land and building. The investments he has made in the building exceed its initial value by more than twentyfold. The lawsuit filed by the National Privatization Agency, the Court of … (continued on page 4) The building over which the Romanian Embassy is making claims

The draft law submitted by the Republican Party has not yet been brought to the attention of Parliament.

A new draft law could change the situation He continues to evade it The appeal hearing in the criminal case against former Prime Minister Fatos Nano and two former officials in his government, Robert Gjini and Hasan Hallko, began with the statement of the prosecutor in the case, Petrit Duka. The prosecutor proposed to the panel of judges that the sentences of defendants Robert Gjini and Hasan Hallko be reduced, and requested that the Tirana District Court’s ruling against defendant Fatos Nano be upheld. In his statement, the prosecutor said that no procedural violations had occurred during the first-instance trial of this case. For defendant Fatos Nano, the prosecutor requested that the Tirana District Court’s ruling, which sentenced him to 12 years’ imprisonment, be upheld. Mr. Duka proposed that 300,000 lekë be deducted from the 72 million lekë Nano is obliged to repay to the state. For defendant Robert Gjini, the prosecutor requested that the sentence be reduced from three to two years’ imprisonment; for Hasan Hallko, the prosecutor requested that the sentence be reduced from one year to ten months’ imprisonment. If the panel of judges accepts the prosecutor’s proposal, defendant Hasan Hallko will be considered free by the end of this week. In his closing statement, the lawyer for defendant Fatos Nano claimed that the prosecutor had distorted the truth. Lawyer Sanxhaku also complained that the prosecutor had not addressed the defense’s requests to supplement the case file with the missing materials. Defendant Nano himself, in his final statement, described his sentence as unjust and made the curious remark, “Free Prometheus.” The ruling will be announced today.

The madwoman N, on Thursday and Tuesday, walks along the central boulevard dressed in a black uniform, without anyone bothering her and despite the many questions from passers-by. On Wednesday morning her apparition, dressed in the same uniform, appeared on the grounds of Tirana Prison and stopped at the cell door of the head of OMOMIA, Bezhani. “What do you want from me?” he asked her. “A terrible death has occurred,” she replied. “Sebastianosi has died.” “If that’s true, then both sides have been saved—he and we ourselves…” “No,” the madwoman interrupted him, “you have not been saved, because tomorrow another Sebastian will be appointed to this job.” “Another? And how do you know about this?” “I know,” said the madwoman. “I alone know and understand your affairs.” “Get this madwoman out of here!” Bezhani shouted. “There’s no need,” said the madwoman. “I’ll leave by myself.” And her apparition vanished in the blink of an eye. On Wednesday evening, in the courtyard of the Albanian Parliament, she gave this short speech: “Briefly. “Prometeu and Fatos Nano are thieves. Prometeu stole fire to give it to humankind, while Fatos Nano stole aid to fill his pockets. In short, I mean that the ancient Greek gave people fire, whereas the modern Hellenophile Nano set Albania on fire. “As is well known, some mayor or minister must have stolen something,” the madwoman said. “At least some rumour should have surfaced. Yesterday Arben Imam-i’s candidacy was exhumed again, to undergo a new expert examination. The fact is that the order for this murder, in the great family of the police, may have come from Gazedene and Villa Number 4. “Intellectual and MP Shaban Memia has gone missing again during these difficult days on the eve of summer. “There is a proposal from the current chairman of the 12-member group that Aganatos Jevalla-tos be the first deputy for all the Balkans. This year, the designated locations for the PS’s political hunting are in Vorio-Epir and farther south.”