Our beloved Albania is filled with schools in every corner. Stories of illiteracy seem very remote—the stories of those generations who were born and died without ever learning to write even their own names, while Europe celebrated the ancient anniversaries of its universities and academies. Every March 7, we celebrate the opening of the doors of Albanian schools, which stand side by side, and at the same time bow with profound respect before the memory of the martyrs of the Albanian letters, of the primer in our mother tongue, and of our national education, which, like the people themselves, have survived every terror. The second century of this beautiful, glorious, and tragic history has just begun (two years ago). Every Albanian family has given it life from its own life, just as it has given blood for the freedom and independence of the homeland. That is why today it rejoices and celebrates that the great army of knowledge, the wonderful youth of the country, is immersed in books in classrooms and lecture halls, keeping abreast of the latest developments in science, technology, and culture. The Party rejoices, the people rejoice that the new generation, thirsting for knowledge, now has all the conditions and every opportunity to be equipped with knowledge at a European and world level. This great care the people show for the knowledge of their youth is an expression of their special concern for the country’s secure present and bright future, for its economy and national culture. From our hearts, we wish everyone today a happy Day of Knowledge, together with your passionate and committed educators! And, at the same time, the people’s great exhortation: study, study, and study again! The Party and the people will create ever greater conditions and opportunities for you, so that the name of the Albanian school and Albanian university may be ever more closely linked to the destiny of the country and socialism, to the people’s culture and its mission, to contemporary science, and to all-round social progress. Happy Day of Knowledge, army of knowledge, science, and culture!

MOMENTS OF A LESSON AT THE «SAMI FRASHËRI» GENERAL SECONDARY SCHOOL IN TIRANA, WHERE GEOGRAPHY TEACHER ROBERT HYKOLLARI TEACHES.

«Zëri...» has a special day today. It is published as issue 13,000. Newspapers, magazines, and press organs have an annual anniversary marking their founding, but a newspaper’s journey is measured not only in years, but also in its issues. The 13,000 issues of «Zëri i popullit» constitute a great history and encompass years, events, anniversaries, celebrations, decisions, and inaugurations; a true encyclopedia containing all of Albania. When today we say «Zëri...», 13,000, that highly perfected «electronic» product of the mind, we are inevitably taken straight back to the first issue of this newspaper... The whole thing consisted of a few handfuls of letters, an old typewriter, a duplicator even older than the typewriter. Then paper, ink, the newspaper’s title painstakingly engraved and... Enver Hoxha, the first editor, the founder of «Zëri i popullit», signs the leading article. The first issue of the newspaper «Zëri i popullit», organ of the Central Committee of the Communist Party, was published in Albania. Through to today, this title, «Zëri i popullit», has been printed on 13,000 pages, in consecutive issues. Dozens upon dozens of tons of lead and type, thousands of tons of paper have been printed. Hundreds of printers, typesetters, and layout workers have followed the issues of «Zëri» over the years. Hundreds of journalists, editors, commentators, chiefs, and directors have passed through a great school and grown up with the newspaper. “Have you read today’s issue of «Zëri...»?” “Yesterday the newspaper had a valuable article, a moving report, a critique...” We hear these opening remarks in people’s conversations so often. The issues of «Zëri i popullit», like our entire press, bring readers the life, concerns, problems, experience, and optimism of the times. The newspaper is a school, a means of expanding knowledge, a conversation with heroes and outstanding workers whom perhaps we do not know as well as we should, but who are close to us and respected for the work they do, the example they set, their ability and wisdom. And I, a reader, and you, a reader, have the pleasure of serving them in their work and life. All these people, through their work, appear every day in the pages of our newspaper, in articles and opinions by our many journalists and contributors. Issue 13,000 finds us growing, finds us in the midst of the work of understanding broadly and correctly implementing the decisions of the latest plenum of the Central Committee. The riverbank... [text continues beyond the edge of the photograph] The channel is narrowing; the threads of comfort are being cut, the reins of control and imposition are being shortened. Debate, the voice of the masses, is rising to a new level, more mature, more comprehensive, more forceful, with no bureaucratic superstructure or screen behind it. The masses, the people of work and knowledge, are not content merely to stand in line: to speak, discuss, and express an opinion. No, the spirit of the 9th Plenum, the spirit of the times, is: to decide, to carry things out, to open a broad path for progress. Therefore, in our assembly with the collective, let us “deliberate on the plans and production, on quality and wages, on rewards. Indeed, even on who should be the director or person in charge; let us do so fairly and democratically, and, once we have examined everything carefully, let us turn our hands to the work, because our duties do not end at the threshold of the meeting hall.” This is not easy; it is not a formula. All the more so because someone will try to settle accounts for personal gain with the people’s money. People gather who are afraid even of their own names and scribble on a piece of paper; others put the collective first and say, “Come on, let’s gather the collective to deal with the violation.” We waste hours, we lose patience. And why? Nothing is proved, or what is proved is not worth the heavy burden. Meanwhile, anonymous letters snap their fingers in the cells. These ordeals must be stopped at the threshold of the hall. For the Party has never had people or cadres who were indecisive. Both someone who has put in many years of work and someone who is to be subject to the rules of replacement, even if they have worked as a leader for a long time, are respected and honored people who deserve the esteem of public opinion, as has always been the case with our people. Nor is there any reason for the replacement of a cadre and the discussion about it to become heated or haphazard. The Party has always stood for order and mature consideration. Ultimately, the replacement of cadres should not be treated as a game of musical chairs: Today I am in this position, tomorrow you... No, the incoming director or person in charge should bring something new to the collective, the enterprise, or the department, advance the work, increase production, and make people’s lives even happier and more cultured. On these and dozens of other issues, the Party, through the newspaper, speaks every day with hundreds and thousands of readers. It consults, receives opinions, spreads experience and, as always, engages in dialogue—but sometimes, through articles, a lifeless, fragile idea creeps in, with slogans and clichés, hackneyed phrases and anachronistic attitudes. The 9th Plenum of the Party’s Central Committee spoke about this too: the bureaucratic phenomenon seeks to hide everywhere. Along with complacency, it also puts down roots in the way people communicate, speak, express themselves, and write. How will this front be fought on? With a sharp pen and a clear mind. With depth in the Party’s decisions and instructions, with a more imaginative presentation of how to bring them down to the ground and implement them, by listening to people’s views and bringing their wise and valuable advice and proposals into the pages of the newspaper. This speaks to the professional and civic responsibility we bear when we take up a pen and sit down to write for «Zëri i popullit». Whoever the author may be—a journalist or a minister, a fellow participant in the dialogue or a volunteer correspondent—for this is also connected to the great weight of Comrade Ramiz Alia’s words: “Every day and at every hour, the truthful chronicles of our people’s struggle to build socialism are to be written in the pages of newspapers and magazines; their biography and history are being written. It is a great honor for journalists and editors, but at the same time a heavy patriotic and social responsibility, to portray clearly and accurately the grandeur of their epoch.” In 13,000 issues, over the course of several decades and in hundreds of thousands of copies, «Zëri i popullit» has spoken every day to Albania, to its life and work; it has spoken to friends and well-wishers everywhere in the world. The newspaper has also spoken with authority on international affairs: on problems and situations, on wars and conflicts. It has spoken justly and in a principled manner, because when it has spoken of freedom, it has had in mind the educational deprivation imposed on our people; when it has spoken of independence, it has had in mind the occupations and invasions that have threatened our homeland; when it has spoken of oppression and exploitation, it has had in mind that heavy burden on the shoulders of the poor and the exhausted worker in the fields and mines: “Have you got any work, sir?...” That is what «Zëri...» has written in these 13,000 issues, and in hundreds of thousands more it will be just as powerful. Tomorrow, «Zëri i popullit», issue 13,001...

Yesterday the Albanian delegation set off for Athens, headed by the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Socialist Republic of Albania, Muhamet Kapllani, who will take part in the meeting of senior officials of the foreign ministries of the Balkan states. At Athens airport, the delegation was received by the Secretary-General of the Greek Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Panajotis Thoma, and other people. As has been announced, at this meeting, which will be held today with the participation of delegations from all the Balkan countries, views will be exchanged on activities carried out among the countries of the region during 1989, on ways to resolve and further develop Balkan cooperation in the political, economic, cultural, scientific, and other fields, as well as on preparations for the meeting of the Foreign Ministers of the Balkan States, which will be held in Tirana in October this year. (ATSH)

On the occasion of the 45th anniversary of the death of People’s Hero Kozma Nushi in the Mathauzen concentration camp, commemorative events were held yesterday in Durrës. Wreaths were laid beside his bust at the entrance to the «Kozma Nushi» rubber factory on behalf of the Party Committee, the Executive Committee of the District People’s Council, the National Committee of Veterans of the Albanian People’s War, the district mass organizations, the family, the factory collective, and others. A thematic afternoon was held in one of the halls of the «Aleksandër Moisiu» Palace of Culture. Those present included the First Secretary of the District Party Committee, Comrade Muho Anllani; the Secretary-General of Myqerem Jani; the Chairman of the Executive Committee of the District People’s Council, Luan Babameto; and other comrades. Veterans and comrades-in-arms of People’s Hero Kozma Nushi shared memories of various moments in his revolutionary activity. An artistic program by the city’s amateur groups was presented during the afternoon. (ATSH)

In the university lecture halls REPORTAGE In the university lecture halls THE DECADE OF MATURITY REPORTAGE I was entering the «Studenti» city, invited by the University literary circle for an ordinary discussion of the kind requested by various authors. Recently, when you see on screen thousands of Albanian students at the University of Prishtina, holding their fingers raised in a V sign of victory, and when we hear threatening voices about closing the university, our minds and hearts always turn to the University of Tirana, where, after centuries of struggle and bloodshed, the Albanian people prepared their own intelligentsia. The students themselves feel this great social responsibility. It makes them energetic, unwilling to accept any kind of old, destructive dust of routine; full of new drive to respond to the decisions of the 8th and 9th plenums of the Party’s Central Committee, which seem to have as their primary driving force this new and vibrant strength of youth. Youth has progress in its soul, quickly recognizes the dust of bureaucracy and anything else unacceptable, and fights every day to attain the highest peaks of knowledge, culture, and science. They are called university students for good reason: at the heart of the name lies the very word «universe». The students talk about literature and the arts; Rafaela Prifti, Andi Beja, Keti Mullai, and others speak, and you truly understand that this is the most beautiful age of life. It poses many questions to you, and for the first time you realize that you also know very well how to answer them. I look at them and compare them with my generation, happy that the youth themselves have come so far. They are the fourth generation of our University, if we measure it in decades. From the first decade, which could also be called the decade of foundations, right up to this present one, the fourth, which could also be called the decade of maturity. This is borne out today by around 14,000 students and hundreds of lecturers, as well as staff serving our society in every field. Today, the shared expectations of lecturers and students are so high that they never stop finding new forms of working together. There are lecturers who regularly hold discussions about their subject and the way it is taught, and who welcome constant criticism and suggestions. Nothing is taboo, least of all the acquisition of knowledge. Lecturer Tefik Qaushti, who has established an aesthetics group with enthusiastic students, says that one must know how to take their opinions into account. Nevertheless, students still speak little, says Alqi Cullaj, head of the Department of Analytical Chemistry in the Faculty of Natural Sciences. Students judge you well because you are with them day after day; if they do not part ways with you, they speak their minds. Otherwise, they are... (Continued on page 3)

- TIRANA - On the occasion of March 7, yesterday the Executive Committee of the District People’s Council organized a festive concert and celebration in the premises of the Palace of Culture, attended by more than 200 outstanding teachers from all the schools in the district, veterans of education, young men and women, and others. - TIRANA - On the occasion of March 7, yesterday the Executive Committee of the District People’s Council organized a festive concert and celebration in the premises of the Palace of Culture, attended by more than 200 outstanding teachers from all the schools in the district, veterans of education, young men and women, and others. Also present were Bardhyl Golemi, Secretary-General of the Ministry of Education; Piro Leka, Secretary of the District Party Committee; and other comrades. The participants were greeted and wished a happy March 7 holiday by Jetmir Allkja, chief specialist for education at the Executive Committee of the District People’s Council. A group of distinguished teachers received orders and «Naim Frashëri» medals awarded by the Presidium of the People’s Assembly. There was applause after the song, with distinguished teachers from the 8-year schools «20 Vjetori» and «Kosova», and the secondary pedagogical school «17 Nëntori», among others, giving interviews. A concert was also given, featuring songs and musical pieces performed by the Palace of Culture’s amateur groups. As part of these events, a seminar on raising the standard of educational work in carrying out the tasks set by the Party and the directives of comrade Ramiz Alia was held at the 8-year school in Shkoza. A festive afternoon was organized at the «Qirbixhiu» school, while students from the «Kongresi i Përmetit» 8-year music school gave a concert at the Central Army House, performing works by the composer and People’s Artist Pjetër Gaci. Events were held in all the activity rooms at the schools «Petro Nini Luarasi», «Sami Frashëri», «Ismail Qemali», «Partizani», «Jerondim De Rada», «Jani Minga», and others. - GJIROKASTER - As part of the March 7 celebrations, the Education Section and the district pedagogical cabinet of Gjirokastër organized an educational conference at which several papers were presented on experience and issues arising in the development of education in the district, in implementation of the decisions of the Party’s 8th Congress and the directives of comrade Ramiz Alia. At the «Sirli Shapllo» art school, a discussion was held on the patriotic and revolutionary life and work of this «People’s Teacher»; an exhibition of work by students in the visual arts department was opened, and a vocal and instrumental concert was given. Themed scientific and artistic afternoons and meetings with veteran teachers were also held at other schools, where concerts were performed with songs and dances for the Party, for comrade Enver Hoxha, and for the joyful new life in our socialist Homeland. (Continued on page 3)

OUTSTANDING TEACHER FLUTURA XHEMAJÇE AT THE «FAN NOLI» 8-YEAR SCHOOL IN TIRANA AMONG THE STUDENTS. (Photos: N. Xhufka)

• TODAY «ZËRI I POPULLIT», 13,000 (1, 2). • CAN RELATIONS BETWEEN THE VOLUMES AND THE BASE BE DEMOCRATIZED FURTHER? (2). • INTERNAL VOLUMES DEMAND SPEED; STUDIES TAKE DECADES (2). • REAWAKENING OF THE REBELLIONS IN KOSOVO (1, 4).

• following the latest news and culture! BERT HYKOLLARI.