Dashnor Kaloçi
Part thirteen
Memorie.al publishes some archival documents with the logo “Top secret”, issued by the Central State Archive in Tirana (Fund of the former Central Committee of the ALP) which belong to 1961 and are part of a voluminous folder with letters , reports, information, reports, instructions, petitions, etc., where it comes to the beginning of contradictions and the breakdown of official Tirana’s relations with the Soviet Union, which at that time was very much felt by Albanian students who were then studying in schools and universities of the Soviet Union, who, by order received from Tirana, discontinued their studies and waited for instructions to return to Albania. The complete file of Albanian students in the former Soviet Union, where most of them, mainly those who attended the Military Academies, the High School of State Security, Police, Border, Justice, etc., had major problems and were met with many vicissitudes with the Russian official authorities, leading to the measure of arrest as well as the intervention of the Albanian military attaché in Moscow, Major General Halim Ramohito, to unblock the situation and return the Albanian military students to their homeland.
Continued from the previous issue
R e l a c i o n
On conversations conducted by the group of State Security officers studying in Leningrad.
In November 1960, the Secretary of the School Komsomol named Cut, seeing Captain Binak Pacin studying the book of Marxism, tells him to study Marxism well, so that when he goes to Tirana, he can teach this subject to Enver. Hoxha, who does not understand this job at all.
Binaku responds by saying: Enver Hoxha has three universities; he is the founder and prominent leader of the ALP, while you have Khrushchev, who has graduated from two technical schools and learns only from corn.
Regarding this issue, the Secretary of the Basic Organization and the Head of the Group, protested to the Secretary of the School Committee, Major Krasheninkov and demanded that measures be taken against him. The Major promised that he would look into the matter and that measures would be taken against him, but he did not take the matter orally anymore.
Conversations have often been made with the professor of Marxism, Maria Sidorova. These conversations mainly took place in seminars and at her request outside the seminars. Thus, for example, in March, when Thimio Laçi went to her cabinet for a consultation, she led the conversation on the contradictions and relations between our parties.
In response to Thimio’s question on the issue of loans and bread, as well as on the fight against revisionism, she replied that: In the first point, it is unbelievable, while in the second point, our party does not have as much of a problem as has your party. That’s supposedly our party, in the fight against Yugoslav revisionism, starts from a nationalist position, especially on the issue of Kosovo.
Thimio explained that: our party in the fight against the revisionists does not start from the nationalist positions, but from the ‘Moscow Declaration’, which it has implemented and is implementing resolutely.
A heated discussion took place at the seminar, where the topic of “the features of states and the forms of their organization” was being addressed. In the discussion made by Andrea Ligori, he mentioned that in today’s world, there are states that by form are republics, but by form and direction, use fascist methods such as the United Arab Republic of Egypt, and Yugoslavia, in which there is no freedom and democracy.
In response, Maria Sidorova rejects these words, considering them a political mistake, as in Yugoslavia, work is currently underway to build socialism, although there are many mistakes in this country.
In response, Andrea and other comrades told her that your explanation was not Marxist, did not correspond to the Moscow Declaration, and that in many cases the official Kremlin’s policy was to the right of the opportunists. At this time, she answers me nervously, that you have no right to criticize the Soviet Union, that you are in the territory of this state, and that we should have respect for that, that you do not own Marxism, that many of you here they learned the first lessons, that your party is criticized by the press of other socialist countries, etc.
At the same time, she warned us to stick to the topics in the seminars and after the seminar, she spread throughout the school that Albanians consider Yugoslavia and Egypt as fascist states, distorting reality. The next day, when we had a seminar, she told Andreas to prepare to speak what we had spoken the day before.
When he repeated the same things, the professor said: I agree with you, that in some countries there are fascist forms, such as Egypt, but did not take Yugoslavia by word of mouth.
One day, the Group Leader and the Secretary of the Basic Organization, in a meeting he had with the School Commander, where among other things he started talking about political issues. He advised us that we are ordinary communists and that we should not deal with political issues, and that the conversations about these things in seminars were not positive.
Then Andrea and Thimio, told him that the communists should not remain indifferent and that they should know everything and judge who is right and who is not. They went on to explain the opportunistic way of their government, which is contrary to the “Moscow Declaration”.
Then, they took all the political and economic pressures used by Khrushchev against the party and our country. Especially when the issue of bread and Khrushchev’s conversation with Venizelos were mentioned. He shrugged in astonishment and said, “The devil understands this.”
It is worth mentioning that the entire responsible staff of the school, in conversations with us, have stated that: we are simple communists and that we should not engage in conversations of a political nature. They wanted to know where we were so informed about these things and that they were not told this information.
Our answer in all cases has been this: that our party always informs us about the right and does not hide anything from us. And your leadership seems to be afraid of the truth and does not tell you anything about these issues. A theoretical conference on the ‘Moscow Declaration’ was held at the school in early March. For this a few days ago, several officers were tasked to prepare for specific issues of the statement.
Our group was tasked with preparing for the fight our party is waging against revisionism. The day before the professor of Marxism asked to hear our paper, and after studying it carefully, made some remarks to change it at some point.
Regarding revisionism, to speak in general and not against the Yugoslav one in particular. Remove the expression where it was quoted that: our party honestly accepts the criticisms made by other parties and at the same time it criticizes them on Marxist grounds, despite the divergences that exist.
We refused to remove these things, explaining that: our party is fighting against revisionism in general and against the Yugoslav one in particular, because that is what the ‘Moscow Declaration’ teaches us.
As for the second issue, we told him: you charged us to prepare for revisionism and not for dogmatism. For the third issue, we told you that: time will tell that your attacks on us are wrong and that they will fail.
The professor was alarmed by these things and told us that in no way will we allow you to use the conference podium for your own purposes. But later, he changed his mind and we were allowed to. At the end our speech was long applauded by those present who cordially congratulated us on this preparation.
In February of this year, a closed letter was drafted at the School Party Organization. A Georgian officer who has always been in our favor, told Koço Bitri that in this meeting it was said that: The Albanian Labor Party and the Communist Party of China are dogmatic.
Koço then, in the presence of several other officers, explains to them the chronology of the disputes from the Bucharest Meeting to the present day. They were surprised and told him that their party did not inform them about these things and started cursing Khrushchev.
Especially during the last period, conversations of this nature were more frequent. We, knowing that they were misinformed, clarified these issues. From these conversations it became clear that some of the officers and trainees were afraid to openly express their opinions. While the rest, expressed in favor of us.
The expulsion of Andrea Ligori from school, made a great impression, because he was one of the best and most distinguished students of the school, as he was also on the honorary table. His dismissal was considered unfair and many of them were convinced of our arguments.
After Andreas’s expulsion from the Basic Organization School, he protested to the School Commander, telling him that this was a serious breach of relations between the socialist countries. The secretary of the Party Committee at the school replied to us that he knew nothing about the matter.
In this regard, it was said that the telegram formulated by the Commander of the School, Colonel Tavstuha, sent from Moscow, may be wrong. We add that the moment we escorted Andrea to the train station, he added, that: as a communist and as a human being, I have no choice but to shut up.
After the break and after the order of the embassy, we asked according to the rules, as soon as possible to leave here and leave for Moscow. But on the part of the school command, we were told that: as long as we do not have such an order for you, we cannot act in this way.
After two days of waiting, on June 12, 1961, Koço Bitri presented himself to the School Commander, requesting the liquidation of his account and travel tickets. He replies that your government’s move to oust you is unfair and that you can continue to attend classes regularly.
While Koço says that: the decision of your government to expel 5 of our friends from the State Security Schools is unfair.
The commander is surprised and says to Koço that: how did you find out that, apart from Andreas, 4 other Albanian friends were expelled?! Finally he expressed that: the expulsion of Andreas was not his order, but order from above.
As for the liquidation of the account and the cutting of tickets, he said: I cannot do anything, as I have no order for this work. But since it is your government’s decision, you can leave on your own whenever you want. And so the school showed no interest in our departure.
It is worth mentioning the attitude and great care of the Russian language professor, Vera Petrova, who has always been very kind to us and has made every effort to gain as much knowledge as possible. When she found out about our departure, she was extremely indignant and called the departure of Andreas, and the attitude of the School Command towards us, unfair.
On the day of our departure, knowing that we lacked the money to cut the train tickets, she borrows money and gives it to us. But we politely did not accept them. She has been with us all the time, and at the moment of separation she cried like a child, begging us to send her a telegram for our arrival./Memorie.al
Andrea Ligori, Thimio Laçi, Koço Bitri, Kiço Gjika
