90 KLA fighters killed, dozens wounded in Tirana Pages 2–3

BY VLADIMIR PRELA There is not the slightest doubt that yesterday’s events in Padesh brought the Kosovo crisis closer to all Albanians: closer to the citizens who watched the dramatic images of war on their screens, closer to state institutions, which could conclude without error that any scenario envisaged for the Kosovo crisis is possible. For the Kosovo resistance, yesterday meant that there is now no turning back, and that what they have embarked upon is not a romantic undertaking, a matter of martial costumes worn for photographs, but a real war with all its rules and harsh consequences. For Albanian politics, the images of Kosovo’s young men arriving from the battlefields torn apart by Serbian shells were a message that it cannot continue to survive as before. Kosovo is no longer a comfortable subject to use to catch an opponent out, nor a reason to gather and vent pathological hatred that astonishes with its aggression. And the Kosovo crisis told all Albanians, masters of making excuses, that the time has passed for tossing the ball of responsibility to one another. This crisis is also discrediting the nationalist clichés of our politicians and leaving many politicians and fabricated patriots out of the game—those who had decided to parcel out Albanians, just as they parcel out politics, into Gegs and Tosks, Kosovars and Albanians, Christians and Muslims. Albania has suffered for centuries from a lack of coordination of ideas and efforts to resolve the national question, and apparently this is not only one of the reasons but also one of the misfortunes that we Albanians are suffering today. From this perspective, uniting all national energies toward resolving the national question has now become a necessity that must be turned into reality. Thus, yesterday’s images also represented a moment for taking action, one that consists in taking care not to draw Albania, the Albanians, or the young men of Kosovo who are fighting to defend their lands into adventures of any kind. It was a moment of facing the situation, one tied more closely to the complexity of the problems being brought about by Serbian aggressive, chauvinist and ethnicist policies toward a population that is increasingly forced to abandon its homes and be displaced. (Continued on page 2)

RENÉA takes up arms P. 7

Solidarity with Albania P. 14 “Meetings with the prime minister and the sweetheart are not talked about” Ceka keeps the secret P. 5 Vlora: police arrest three, accused of murder Gaxhai’s gang in handcuffs P. 11 Owner of the phantom smuggling ship arrested “Demon” boss caught P. 6

“Meetings with the prime minister

Head of government launches new attacks on the President Nano: The Presidency should be unifying and not serve political clans Interview with the President of the Republic Meidani: Here are my relations with the prime minister President Meidani lighting Prime Minister Nano’s cigarette Photo GENT SHKULLAKU Head of government launches new attacks on the President Meidani serves the clans Nano: The Presidency should be unifying and not serve political clans Fatos Nano against Rexhep Meidani. The President has been placed in the service of political clans. The President has not played his unifying role. The prime minister says: “I take this opportunity—at the Tirana PS conference—to encourage the President of the Republic to strengthen his unifying role and to place the greatest confidence in the person entrusted with the mission of this office as the constitutional, not political, guarantor of the state’s balance.” P. 5 President Meidani lighting Prime Minister Nano’s cigarette. Photo GENT SHKULLAKU