Yesterday, the People’s Assembly decided to waive the agricultural land tax for 1996, as well as outstanding liabilities for 1994 and 1995. The imposition of this tax had been approved in March ’94 through the law on agricultural land tax. However, while it was applied to builders, there were several problems with agricultural land tax relating to the completion of documentation and the accurate determination of land classification. As a result, approximately 130 million lekë were collected in agricultural land tax over the last two years, 1994–1995, with considerable shortfalls in its collection. Today’s law gives rise to another free initiative by private farmers and helps increase private investment in rural areas. All parliamentary groups expressed themselves positively about this law and supported its approval without reservations.

Eurobarometer data confirm: 58 percent of socialists are satisfied with the development of democracy 42 percent of socialists are dissatisfied and remain loyal to the past Eurobarometer data confirm: The SP is divided into two blocs 58 percent of socialists are satisfied with the development of democracy 42 percent of socialists are dissatisfied and remain loyal to the past

The deep rift between the leadership and the grassroots of the SP has now also been confirmed by prestigious international institutions such as Eurobarometer. 58 percent of socialists are satisfied with the development of democracy in Albania, and 42 percent are not. These are Eurobarometer’s findings on the state of the SP. Ruçi and Islami’s zeal in carefully choosing the delegates who would take part in the first phase of the SP’s latest congress, as well as their total rejection of the values of democracy proclaimed in Pëllumbi’s report and Nano’s message, further confirm this division. The Eurobarometer survey results on SP members’ attitudes towards the development of democracy in Albania have prompted these compromised figures who have occupied the SP leadership to close ranks among the nostalgists and carefully control the space that will be available at this congress. The anathemas against democracy delivered from the podium of this congress would inevitably provoke a reaction among the delegates if they had been sent here without being “screened” by Ruçi. The discussions, too, would not have followed the line of the legislative texts announced in Pëllumbi’s report if this “screening” had not been carried out beforehand. Thus, fully aware of the severe crisis that has engulfed this party, the former minister of the communist secret police, outraged by some heralds of Ramiz Alia or former lecturers at the V. Lenin Party School, doctors of Marxist sciences, decided to take ownership of the SP, using their sharpest weapon to preserve a false unity. After the attack they carried out against the Maleshovist reformist group, they chose the selection of their own delegates as the sole means of avoiding legal confrontation. Filling the hall with carefully selected delegates was the only suitable ground on which the SP’s Marxist-conservative leadership could proclaim its regressive ideas: undermining the legal institutions of democracy or placing the free market under state control. Only before delegates selected by Ruçi could such a wholly rejecting stance be taken towards every achievement, or resolutions be revived not to condemn the dictatorship and dictator Hoxha, but to overthrow Berisha. The head of the socialists increased the distance from the grassroots, along with their fear, and struck at it at this congress. This SP leader presented himself as an alternative for the subjugation of democracy and its institutions, while Eurobarometer reports that 58 percent of socialists are satisfied with the development of democracy. But this estrangement from the grassroots, with elections conducted through ugly demagoguery, will inevitably bring about the disintegration of this party. This is because the grassroots cannot help but see how cynically and brutally they are being used by this compromised caste of Enverist Marxist conservatives who have taken over the SP leadership, crushing every attempt at reform from within. The day is not far off when the “generals” of the SP will be abandoned en masse by the ordinary membership of this party. This is because the dictate and massification of this party by one and the same force have imposed control throughout its structures, naturally creating a sad state among its members. This is driven by the fact that an ordinary citizen, or even a communist, who wants to be independent of informers—and who today numbers in the millions in this party—has nothing in common with the secretaries of the communist regime, Gramoz Ruçi, the former minister of the secret police under the Hoxha regime, or the people with their absurd former registration practices; nor with those who uphold and feed this system, professors at the SP’s higher school who know nothing of Marx, former security chiefs and former spies, or Islami and Dokle. Therefore, the appropriation of the SP by these figures is a dangerous adventure that will bring about its final destruction. The Byzantine manoeuvring carried out by the SP leadership to set this party apart, although it contains the harshness of exclusion, also sustains ongoing fear. It is this permanent fear that prevents the creation of genuine elections within this party. By portraying it as divided into two blocs, the nostalgists have finally decided, at any cost, to break up this party, seeking to use it to drive the SP away. This approach, putting those in the SP who have become part of the party’s incriminating scheme at the service of the democrats, is part of the plan. The party law is capable of highlighting the contradictions, in a manner that is almost vigilant, so as to enable these nostalgists’ careers and, as a consequence, bring about further departures that will ultimately end in a split in the SP.

Albania–Greece Greece’s policy towards Albania, Mr. Stefanopullos said, is a policy of good neighbourliness, acceptance of the territorial status quo, inviolability of borders, mutual respect, peaceful cooperation and respect for human rights, including the rights of minorities. The President also referred to Albanian citizens who live and work in Greece, saying that Greece pursues a liberal visa policy towards Albanian citizens. p. 2

The President and the delegation at the meeting.

Serbs celebrate the day of the Albanian tragedy in Kosovo In an effort to force Albanians to celebrate this tragic day of occupation, the violent Serbian authorities installed in Kosovo yesterday prevented Albanians from holding lessons in many schools. SERBIA Sandžak Novi Pazar Trepça Mitrovica Vucitrna Montenegro Podujeva KOSOVO Peja Gjilani Prishtina Ferizaj Prizreni ALBANIA Shkodra Kukësi Tirana Macedonia p. 2

FRY has not honoured its commitments Williamson: a government that shelters criminals, that supports war criminals in full view of the world, becomes a criminal state p. 2

Reaction - Individuals today have their paths open, can find themselves freely, and have no reason to become anyone’s servants, as you at “KJ” have become today—servants and lackeys of the communist past! As for President Berisha, the first to be elected by the unanimous vote of the Albanians, I say wholeheartedly that he has my respect and my sympathy for his courage and manliness as a true Albanian! I read closely, feeling offended, the article published in the newspaper “KJ” dated 24.3.1996, in which my name was mentioned in the most cynical and malicious way. In that article, a certain A.M., in an extremely vile and treacherous manner—and so much so that I cannot fully express it—attacks me personally, describing me in such a way that I was compelled to respond again, because so much falsehood was being presented there. First of all, you are a [unclear] of the newspaper “KJ” and you owe insinuations to its journalists… (Continued on page 3)

SOCIALIST PARTY OF ALBANIA 1991 p. 3