Dashnor Kaloçi
Part eight
Memorie.al/ publishes some archival documents extracted from the Central State Archive in Tirana (Fund of the former Central Committee of PPSh), which contain the acronym “Secret” and “Top Secret” and belong to a period from January from 1982 until September 1983, where there is a voluminous file with minutes of meetings of the Secretariat of the Central Committee and the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the PPSh, meetings which were chaired by its General Secretary, Enver Hoxha, where they assisted: Ramiz Alia, Adil Çarçani, Manush Myftiu, Hekuran Isai, Rita Marko, Pali Miska, Hajredin Çeliku, Haki Toska, Simon Stefani, Lenka Çuko, Muho Asllani, Vangjel Çerrava, etc., as the main topic is analysis about the “hostile activity” of Mehmet Shehu and his close collaborators, from Fadil Paçrami, Todi Lubonja, Beqir Balluku, Petrit Dume, Hito Çako, Abdyl Këllezi, Koço Theodhosi, Kiço Ngjela, Vasil Kati, Kadri Hazbiu, Fiqret Shehu, Feçor Shehu, Mihalla q Ziçishti, Llambi Peçini, etc. In the file available to Memorie.al, in addition to the analysis of the “hostile activity of the police agent Mehmet Shehu and his associates Beqir Balluku and Kadri Hazbiu”, in the meetings of the Political Bureau and the daily meetings of the Secretariat of the PPS Central Committee, are analyzed also the activity of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and State Security, with its agency and collaborators, inside and outside the country, the reports and relations of the Albanian state with different countries of the world, such as: the USA, the Soviet Union, West Germany, England, Spain, Italy, as well as those with neighbors, such as Greece and Yugoslavia and the demonstrations in Kosovo, how the world press presented Socialist Albania, the talks with West Germany about the War reparations payments, meetings and conversations with party leaders Marxist-Leninists from different countries of the world, such as Ernst Aust, Zhoao Amazonas, Fosko Dinuçi, etc., regarding the “suicide of Mehmet Shehu”, the problems of Polish immigration Albanian refugees, in different countries of the world, and the change of the exchange rate of the dollar in the remittances, which they made to their relatives in Albania, up to numerous economic problems, from heavy industry, hydropower plants on the cascade of the river Drin, energy import and export, etc., etc.
Continues from last issue
The “Top Secret” document with the minutes of the daily meeting of the secretaries of the PPSh Central Committee, held on September 12, 1983, where they discussed: “On the conclusion of the trial against the traitors, conspirators, and coup plotters, Kadri Hazbiu, Feçor Shehu , etc. As well as for the announcement that must be made to the Party organizations, about them”.
DAILY MEETING OF THE SECRETARIES OF THE CENTRAL COMMITTEE OF THE PARTY ON SEPTEMBER 12, 1983
Top Secret
In this meeting, the Secretaries of the Central Committee of the Party of Labor of Albania, Ramiz Alia, Lenka Çuko, and Vangjel Çërrava, as well as comrades Muho Asllani, member of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee and First Secretary of the Party Committee of Durrës district, Pali Miska, member of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee and First Secretary of the Elbasan district Party Committee, where the problem was raised:
On the conclusion of the trial against traitors, conspirators, coup plotters, Kadri Hazbiu, Feçor Shehu, etc. As well as for the announcement that must be made to Party organizations, on them.
COMRADE RAMIZ ALIA: People found out that the trial against the gang of conspirators, terrorists, and coup plotters, led by the polyagent Mehmet Shehu, with participants: Kadri Hazbiu, Feçor Shehu, Llambi Ziçishti, Fiqrete Shehu, etc., is taking place.
COMRADE MUHO ASLLANI: They found out that they heard it one after the other. Perhaps now after the trial, it may be necessary to make some clarifications in the Party organizations.
COMRADE RAMIZ ALIA: We intend to make such a clarification. Comrade Enver ordered us for this. After the 7th Plenum of the Central Committee, it is planned to send to the Party and the People a communique of the Supreme Court of the SRSH. These days it can be ready.
COMRADE PALI MISKA: So it is intended to act, as was done for Beqir Balluk and other enemies.
COMRADE MUHO ASLLANI: Clarification is necessary in every basic Party organization.
COMRADE RAMIZ ALIA: Both trials, like the first one that was held with open doors, where the enemies Fiqret Shehu, Skënder Shehu, Llambi Ziçishti, and Nesti Nase were tried and sentenced, as well as the second one that because of secrets military, it was done behind closed doors, where Kadri Hazbiu, Feçor Shehu, etc. were tried and sentenced, and were conducted well and with interest.
What was most important during these trials is that the conspirators and terrorists were debunked with facts and documents. They had nothing to hold them, especially Kadriu and Feçori, who tried to hide their guilt, because they wanted to hide their activity, and obstruct justice to reach a correct conclusion. However, the facts put their shoulders to the wall.
For example, there was the problem of highly secret State Security documents that these enemies sent to the Soviet KGB. Kadri Hazbiu began to say that Llambi Peçini did this. Llambi Peçini did not deny this, but told him: “I really did this, I really signed it, but you gave the order.”
COMRADE VANGJEL ÇARAVA: They gave orders for this or that.
COMRADE RAMIZ ALIA: “No, I don’t remember giving you such an order”, said Kadri Hazbiu. “You don’t remember, but look at the regulation of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, what it says” , answered Llambi Pecini. He told him to look at the regulations because he wanted to save his head.
“In that regulation, – continued the enemy Llambi Peçini, – it is said that, with the exception of the minister, no one else has the right to receive the highly secret documents. Therefore, how could I receive them, without your order”?!
COMRADE MUHO ASLLANI: This rule is legislated.
COMRADE RAMIZ ALIA: “I don’t remember giving you that order, Kadri Hazbiu told him.” “You don’t remember it, but I remember it,” replied Llambi Peçini.
COMRADE PALI MISKA: Even Kadri Hazbi’s meeting with Mehmet Shehu, on the night of December 17, 1981, before the latter killed him, is not without meaning.
COMRADE RAMIZ ALIA: That meeting became a complete comedy. Enemies Fiqrete Shehu and Ali Çeno, testified in detail about the circumstances of how that meeting took place. Fiqrete Shehu, explained that; that night before the polyagent Mehmet Shehu killed himself, Kadri Hazbiu came home, who had told Mehmet Shehu that, one of the questions and discussions that were asked at the meeting of the Political Bureau, was that your condition is very serious and that suspected that the non-leadership of the Party had any compromising signal towards him.
Kadri Hazbiu, denied the meeting and to prove his alibi, asked that his driver be questioned as a witness in the trial, as well as a person to whom, that night, Kadriu had gone for a birthday anniversary. His driver came as a witness, and they asked him: “What did you do that night, when Mehmet Shehu killed himself”?!
“That night, – he explained, – after the meeting of the Political Bureau ended, I took Kadri by car and took him to his office. As soon as I took him to the office, he sent me home; I took a bag of tobacco. I went home; I took the tobacco bag and took it to the ministry. When I gave him the bag, he said: Wait for me, I’ll go downstairs. I did the same.
I went downstairs and was waiting for him, where he didn’t take long and Kadri Hazbiu came, and after getting into the car he told me to walk from the boulevard. And so I did. When we came to the bridge of Lana, he told me to turn right and I drove up to the house that enters the Block”.
The President of the Court, Comrade Aranit Çela, asked him: “Where did you go”?! “I went,” the driver told him, “to my friend Rita Marko’s house and I stopped there. Kadriu got out of the car and entered the Block. I don’t know where he went. I stayed there for about 20 minutes after exactly I don’t remember, but after a while, Kadriu came back. From there I took him to the house of someone named Ismail.”
The President of the Court said to Kadri: “You have to ask questions to the witness”?! “Yes, – he replied, – I will ask him questions”. And you know what question he asked him?! “Do you remember when you took me there by car; did I get off or not?”?!
COMRADE MUHO ASLLANI: What question?!
COMRADE RAMIZ ALIA: The question seems stupid, but he had calculated them. And the driver, you know what he said?! “Why did I take you there, so that you could sit in the car?! I took you where you told me, you got out of the car, entered the block, and after a while you came. I don’t know where you went”!
Kadri Hazbiu, knowing the driver, had calculated that with these questions, he would confuse him, so that the driver would say that he did not know where he came from. So apparently, he was looking for something to grab onto. If the driver said that I don’t know if Kadriu got out of the car or not, then the latter would say: “When the driver doesn’t know if I got out of the car or not, then how does he remember if I led there”?!
But the driver did not lose it. After the driver, the owner of the house, where the party took place, came as a witness and said: “I had my 35th birthday, but I had not invited Kadri Hazbiu. From 8:00 in the evening, I was informed that Kadri Hazbiu would be a little late, but we had to leave the chair empty for him, he would come in. We started with dinner, and I drank a little because I was happy.
At one point, they tell me that Kadri Hazbiu is coming and I, as I was wearing a jacket, because I was sweaty. And after I went down, I sat there for a while, and after Kadriu came, I took him upstairs”. The President of the Court, friend Arani, asked him: “What time was it, when Kadri Hazbiu came”?!
“By the way, Ismaili told him, I haven’t seen the time, but it occurs to me that it must have been around 9:30 or 10:00, since it had been a long time since we started and I had had a few drinks. When Kadriu came, I I also drank two glasses and then I don’t remember anything, as I became a cork. They took me and took me out of the room.”
After the testimony of the witness finished, the President of the Court addressed Kadriu: “Are you going to ask the witness”?! Yes, he told her, and to confuse her, he asked her this question: “Well, you were drunk, how do you remember if I came at 9:30 or 10:00”?! “When you came home I remember it well, he told her, because I got drunk after you came and not before you came.
Second, I remember very well that I had been drinking and sweating, and later I got a croup that I was in the hospital for two weeks. So, when I left the hospital, I had time to think about where I got this brooch, and I got it there, when I went out to meet you, because I was sweaty.
I couldn’t have sweated in 5 minutes, so I had been drinking since we started the party, and from that moment, an hour and a half or two hours had passed, and that’s why I’m sure you came to that hour”.
Even if there were no other witnesses, just with what these two said, it is too much. That is, he was put in front of these facts. Halit Kaçanolli also appeared as a witness.
COMRADE PALI MISKA: Haliti of Fier.
COMRADE RAMIZ ALIA: Yes, Haliti of Fier. In this trial, he showed some concrete facts. Among other things, he said that; Kadri Hazbiu, has met in Gjakova with a person close to Rankovic, one of his agents, he even mentioned him by name. I know this, since the bases where we were there were de-conspired, said Haliti.
They told me that so-and-so debunked them. And this is so true, he emphasized, that to get out of Yugoslavia, I found the bela, encountered forces on the way and was injured, when I finally crossed to Tropoja. There, they healed me and then I came to Tirana.
However, this information that they told me, that Kadri Hazbiu has met the representative of Rankovic, twice across the border, I had written so that I would not forget it, and I had put the letter with this note in the heel of my shoe, which when I came here, I took it out. Who should I give it to; who should I tell it to, better than the minister?!
Then I decided, – he said, – to go to Mehmet Shehu. (Laughs) He was then Minister of the Interior until 1954. I told Mehmet, so and so, and then I left. When after this meeting, no more than two months passed, Kadri Hazbiu called me.
COMRADE PALI MISKA: Mehmet Shehu, he had told him.
COMRADE RAMIZ ALIA: Yes, then. “Why do we send you, Kadriu had told him, to track me down”?!
COMRADE MUHO ASLLANI: That’s what he told him?! Memorie.al
Next issue follows
