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A. ILIAZI At a Yugoslav parliamentary session in Belgrade, a vote was cast in favor of creating a “Union” with Russia and Belarus. [text continues beyond the edge of the image] What is this “union” after the breakup of empires in these regions? The revival of Slavo-Russian solidarity has to do with the prospects for post-communist transition in the face of Western hegemony, and especially with Russia’s future role. Following events in the former Soviet Union and former Yugoslavia, the conflict between anti-Western and pro-Western positions in the Slavic countries, so different from one another, is very much present. The former communist governments of these countries have made serious efforts to create an ethnic metaphysics, suggesting that every tendency toward integration is determined by their particular history. In Eastern Europe, politics has always been viewed as a geopolitical and historical destiny, not freed from ethno-metaphysical prejudices. The idea of the “Union” to be created is nothing but a jealous reaction to the West. Serbs and Russians seek to revive Eastern Europeans’ respect for themselves. This is a liberal-conservative version of the revival of national communism. The “Union” calls for a community of bombs rather than a community of states, understanding nations as ethnocultural groups and not as political communities of citizens. Mc Tej, p. 3

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visit: www.albaniaonline.net (see page 5)

• Pregnant woman with a seven-month-old baby killed. Children massacred, hanged from telephone poles. 80 men were tortured with blunt instruments. A man from Gjakova tells of the Serbs who cut off the head of a one-year-old child. The massacre of the 17 in Gjakova: They locked them in a house and set it on fire. Pages 7, 9 “STUHIA” brings the first NATO soldiers. The 230 French arrive P. 6

• Angjeli: we need 800 million dollars. The loan-sharking Arab announces his next fraud Page 9 • 22-year-old woman dies; midwives are missing Page 6 • Kosovars are looking for one another Page 11