The Secretary General of the Socialist International invites the PSSH to the meeting of the IS Council PAGE 7 Fasino alongside Italian President Scalfaro

The Albanian government on the verge of signing the SAF-2 agreement PAGE 7

Further decentralization, expansion of powers, financial independence, among the ministry of local government’s main priorities PAGE 2

The former chairman of the Shkodër judges sent it to the newspaper's editor-in-chief PAGE 6

President Alia: the Democrats are brandishing the hammer, counters Kadriu's attacks PAGE 5

Statement of the Summit of Foreign Ministers of the G-8 countries PAGE 8

Kaçulini's slanders prompt the prosecutor's office to investigate, but the PD chairman shields the old guard. Attack against politicians from friendly countries

Dear Mrs. Luka, Only through obscuring and slander can the truths that are being forcefully made transparent every day by the institutions of the Albanian state with the determined help of the international community be dimmed. Mr. Kaçulini is following this path as well, and his latest slander has been made at the moment when a first stage of the reform is being successfully completed and moving on to its further and more complex stages. In times like these, it happens that spokesmen and mudslingers accuse the most worthy and respected people of the country of being criminals or common offenders. Mr. Kaçulini's slander concerning the handcuffing of the sulfur figure is a scripted effort to cloud the assessment, sadly medieval, of misery and of the terrible lack of vision for the country's democratic, cultural and human development. The target of this slander is the Chairman of the Assembly of the Socialist Party and its deputy in the Parliament of Albania, Servet Pëllumbi. Kaçulini's attack, which speaks of behavior under the mask of "Greek nationality," is nothing more than an act of slander against the speaker of parliament and, at the same time, against respected Greek, but also Italian and German partners, with whom Albania and its relations with Europe are gaining every day the lost identity and security. In the overall situation of the pathology of slander and offensive discrediting, the idea becomes clearer that the author of these slanders is a person incapable for political, intellectual and moral reasons and that he is entirely hopeless for the culture of history and of truth. I believe that the help of wise people, including you, will put an end to a kind of sludge of slander that serves speculators and testifies to the vile conspiracy of the dead security service. Such slander is also that against the former chairman of the Shkodër Court, a person rightly respected in that city and throughout Albania for his integrity and professionalism. Under these conditions I consider it reasonable that all this wave of smearing of honest figures and the irresponsibility that Mr. Kaçulini is bringing around him should receive the response it deserves from the competent state authorities. Attacks like the latest one against Mrs. Pino Arlacchi, Chair of the Board of the "Task Force" on the criminal economy, and Mrs. Ana Karamanlu, Chair of the Board of the "Task Force" for aid, as well as against the esteemed American diplomat Marisa Lino, cannot fail to cause concern just as much as such a slander. All such slanders are an occasion to once again express the support we give and will give to every person and every foreign office involved in the work of assistance and the civilization of Albania. Sincerely, Fatos Nano Tirana 12.05.1998