By Nestor Topencharov
The sixth part
THE DRAMA OF LIFE
(THE STORY OF A FAMILY)
I dedicate this book to: All fellow sufferers. Their families. And in particular, to people who did not have the opportunity to tell the odyssey of life, during the communist dictatorship.
FOREWORD
Memorie.al / I were born in the city of Korça, on October 22, 1953. I left Albania in October 1990, after we were given the right to repatriate to Yugoslavia (now North Macedonia). In June 1992, I immigrated to Italy, where I still live today. Although I have been away for 32 years, I did not cut ties, as Albania was the country of my birth, where I spent 37 years, and that part of my blood is Albanian. Years later, the ties with Albania were strengthened, as I also took my wife from Durrës. We came every year on vacation, but the short time of our stay meant that many contacts were cut off. However, true friends and comrades remained forever in my heart.
In the last three years, I did not have the opportunity to visit Albania. But during 2022, I came several times. My commitment on the one hand and the coincidence on the other, made it possible for me to re-establish connections with friends and colleagues whom I had not seen for decades. Knowing my past, some of them advised me to write down what had happened in my life. At first, this idea seemed like a utopia to me, since even though I had been a good student; I had no inclination towards drafting. Then I reflected. I would just write my story, true events, where not much inspiration was needed. Perhaps a writer would know how to present these events, as a true pen artist knows. While I will write them, without many descriptions: briefly, simply, naked, as they happened.
Something else that pushed me even more to write this book was an interview on TV Klan, which I saw in October of this year, directed by the well-known journalist Blendi Fevziu. I did not seek revenge. But I didn’t even have justice. With the help of this book, I will make known to the Albanian public opinion, the role of the individuals who contributed to my suffering and that of my family. And today, I am putting my finger on these “beings”, not for the task they had, but for the way they performed it. I will start my writing with my grandfather, from my mother’s side, to continue with my father, where I will touch on the most important moments of their lives. This will help the reader to know my background.
Then I will also talk about myself. In this book I will also tell some events, one more dramatic than the other, that happened to people I had the honor of knowing. I am glad that many books have been published on the suffering and persecution of “enemies of the people” and their families in internment camps and prisons during the communist dictatorship. I was able to read some of these works. I believe that this book, in a modest way, will contribute to know even more the inhumane methods of the State Security, the way they created accusations and how they destroyed people and families to keep the people under terror.
The author
December, 2022
Continues from last issue
CHAPTER TWO
It was the first time in those two months that I met this intriguer’s eyes. After these words, the nervousness of Heraclius reached its peak. I mentioned above, that he was sitting at the end of the bed. His feet moved sometimes one and sometimes the other, hitting the front. His face contorted and darkened. I can’t explain to you, the true color he got. He stood up and after staring into my eyes, he started to release all the bile he had inside.
– “You! – He told me. – You are a sworn enemy of this power, from the top of your hair to your toenail! You have to drag your whole life! No matter how much you are punished now, we will punish you again and you will never get out of prison again”! I looked at this spirit with disgust. That was the last time I saw him.
Towards the end of December, they bring us another soldier. They called him Vasillaq and accused him of a murder that had been committed near his village. Later, during the investigation, he found out that his father was also arrested for this reason. He had left the tank at the factory (since Vasillaqi served in the army in the tank department) and had returned home, without permission. His bad luck, that on the day of his return, the murder had happened and the police dog had directed him to his house. He insisted that he was innocent, but no one believed him during the investigation.
In addition, one day when they returned him, a mole on his face hurt, ending with some hairs that had been pulled out. After a week that he stayed with us Vasillaq was taken away from us. When there were three of us, we were close to sleep. When one of us wanted to switch arms, the three of us would get up and roll around. Months later, I was the fourth one myself for a few days. When we lay down to sleep, we chose the width, where you could not stretch your legs completely, and to stretch them, we lifted them on the wall.
During this period, they changed my investigator. The third phase of my investigation began. The investigations were now being followed by Ligor Kondili. After the indictment was delivered to me, everything became clear. They would punish me for agitation and propaganda. From the first investigation, he kept the minutes of the questions and answers. I was impressed that from the file in front of him, he took out a photo of a size of approximately 9×12 cm. which we had taken in the last year of the faculty, which was needed for the documents. Of course, the moment when I was in the picture, a Nestor had fixed it, in the happiest period of his life.
While now before Kondil, there was another Nestor, at least in appearance. Consequence of the psychological state, the difficult living conditions in the dungeon, the bad food and above all, the treatment I was given by the investigator in those months. How my new look looks, it didn’t match the photo. Therefore, he sometimes looked at me and sometimes at the photo, as if he would get an answer from it, to clarify his doubt. Finally, I removed this dilemma, telling him ironically, so that he would not suspect that the photo was mine.
At first, Ligori insisted that it was my friends who accused me of agitation and propaganda. But he did not tell me who these friends were. In short, he didn’t tell me anything concrete either. For my part, I continued, as always, to reject the accusations. When I was taken to the investigator, it was a period when a lot of snow had fallen. It happened that there was also sun, whose light and the reflection of the snow blinded me. Kondil’s office was in the other building and when I passed through the courtyard and entered, I could not see.
It seemed to me that I had powerful searchlights in front of my eyes, which turned on and off. It took minutes for the vision to stabilize. The same thing happened to me when I returned to the darkness of the dungeon. I had another problem. With the light clothing I had on, in the dungeon, the body was used to it. But when I went outside to go to the investigator, I was greeted by the cold, with minus temperatures. So, to the problem of the eyes, the big change in temperature, which hit my body, was added.
During the investigations with him, I noticed that he tried to open various topics, related to works and writers of world literature. Maybe to understand my worldview, because that’s how they had instructed him. In the difficult situation I was in, those conversations of his seemed washed out. I cut him off several times, because I was not interested in those discussions.
In the middle of the month, one morning, I had a run-in with one of the young policemen on duty. For this, by order of the guard officer and with the knowledge of my interrogator, I was sentenced to three days in irons. Above, I showed you how to tie the hands from behind. In this case, after making sure that they had tightened them well, they put on the joint. The first night, I didn’t have a bad time.
Joseph folded all the blankets and made a sort of high pillow. Thus, I was able to support my head, without straining my shoulder, since the only position was lying on my side. The policeman on duty, who checked from the counter at night, in these cases also saw if the bars were in place. During the day it was different, because when the meals came, they took them away. The second night, I had a little more difficulty.
I started to feel pain in my shoulder, but even this night passed with little pain. It was the third night that made me suffer a lot. The pain in the shoulder was very strong. I could not lie down, in any position. My hands also started to hurt. When they brought breakfast, they finally took it away from me. Even today, 46 years have passed; the marks of those irons have not disappeared from my hands.
From the end of January in the dungeon, they bring us Vasillaq, again. As soon as he saw it, Joseph signaled to me to be careful. The soldier told us that during this time, they had kept him in another cell and that the investigation continued, but until that moment, they had nothing new. Then he wanted to know how our investigation had gone.
I told him that I had been accused of agitation and propaganda. Time passed. Silence reigned through the dungeons, which was broken from time to time by the loud sound of the door latches opening and closing. The investigation continued at full speed. From time to time, it met the three of us.
After a few weeks, Joseph was removed from our dungeon. Later I found out that they had sent him back to Spac. As a few more weeks passed, Vasillaqi told me that the real killer had been caught. His father had been released and was going to be made a communist, for the determined stance he had taken. As for him, they had given him 3 months (minimum), for escaping without permission, and he would finish the sentence in the cell.
All the time he had left, he stayed with me and the day before he was released, he advised me that if any new arrestees were brought to me, I should not tell him the charge of the arrest. This, on the one hand, confirmed Josif’s suspicion, but on the other hand, it showed that Vasillaqi was also an honest boy. The next day we said goodbye and I wished him all the best.
Then, for several weeks, they left me alone. Ligori used his deceptive methods to convince me to accept. According to him; “they had a party duty”, so that the people could see that people were not punished in vain. This, according to him, would help the mother and sister not have consequences. After these efforts also went in vain, the confrontation with the witnesses began.
The first three who came from the faculty, one boy and two girls, were strangers to me. We were in the same faculty, but we didn’t have friends. I noticed a frightened look on the girls’ faces. Maybe it was my “transformation” that provoked this. And that boy was sitting there next to the fireplace and smoking a cigarette without stopping, without raising his head, the whole time. It was all a farce. Perhaps they too regretted entering this dance.
Then it was the turn of my two Korcar friends. I had many friends in the city, like those from childhood, who had grown up together, high school friends, many others whom I had met in the summer, when I went up to do gymnastics in the hills of Saint Thanas (by Mr. Kene). Who is a hiker, knows those beautiful hills full of rogovecka (acacia) that would delight you with the fragrance of their white flowers.
After I was arrested, they took all the photos we had to see my friends, and they were able to convince two of them to become my witnesses. In short, they were not telling a truth, but a slander. In these cases, there is often talking about spies and very little about slanderers and intriguers. For me, slander is more serious than espionage.
The accusations of these witnesses, with lies and slander, collided in your eyes. They got into trouble. Ligori, not only did not seek to reveal the truth, as the investigator of the case, but he adjusted the testimonies, so that they would be more reliable in the trial. In short, this investigator proved once again that they did their best to burden me as much as possible. It was clear to me that even if these witnesses were not there, they would find others.
Time passed, and after confrontations, Ligori tried to get me to accept the charge. When that wasn’t coming, at some point he opened the cards. He explained to me the real reason, why I was being punished. According to them, I would be punished because I had not stopped my father from making requests to return to Yugoslavia. So that meant I agreed to go to an enemy country. Therefore, I was also an enemy. And warned me that; if I were to declare these words in court, I would also be punished for defamation.
What shame! In addition, he tried to scare me, that when I appeared in court, I would have to see what the prosecutor would do to me. During the investigations, other investigators came from time to time, who exchanged two or three words with Ligor. These Branch employees were indifferent to me. I was impressed by one of them. He had just returned from Tirana. He was talking about an exam he had taken and was not satisfied with the grade.
In addition, the professor had asked him ironically at the end, about the assessment. What impressed me was that at this moment, this investigator wanted to have this professor as a defendant. To tell him…!
They had spent five months in the investigator and still had not achieved the result they wanted. Since they had to bring me to trial and it was important for them that I accept the charges, they decided to force me, with physical violence. When I was taken to the investigation office, the policeman ordered me to leave, without removing the handcuffs. Kondil was sitting in front of the table, in front of me. At this time, he notified the “examination investigator” that I mentioned above.
I told you about his ignorance. He was a young man. When he came, he brought with him a piece of wood, more than a meter long, which was certainly taken out with an ax, from a twisted trunk. This piece of wood, along its entire length, was accompanied by thin, sharp parts. At first he gave me hard slaps in the face, to continue with punches in the stomach and to finish with a wooden blow from the legs.
These scenes were repeated in several sessions. During these moments, Ligori covered his face with his hands, apparently feeling sorry for what was happening. Every now and then he opened his fingers a little, to see the condition. In two cases, the floor tiles also bled. When he saw that at worst he did not achieve the desired result, he began again with the trick, expressing his regret for what had happened. That this had not been in his hand. I felt contempt for this hypocrite and did not reply.
At the beginning of April, I was brought to court. I didn’t understand why I was being punished by a military court. There were few people in the courtroom. From what I found out later, they had not issued a warning. They had not informed me, not even my family members. It seems they had decided to end this process quickly. They had opened the word that I was accused of being an agent and now the people would assist in a comedy, with the accusations of some palaces, for agitation and propaganda. “The mountain became pregnant and a mouse was born,” the people say.
The prosecutor began to speak (as I had seen in the movies), in a strict and loud tone, accusing me of “agitation and propaganda, of undermining popular power”. After the prosecutor, the judge asked me to express myself, if I accepted the charge. As during the investigation, my answer was negative. The faculty witnesses came out and made those two or three accusations; “for the best schools and for the best life outside”. In that period, there was no defense lawyer, I did not know the laws, and as accused of politics, there was no justice.
However, sometimes it happened that the court did something different, to let the people understand that justice existed, and the punishments were given by it and did not come from the Security. For this reason, the judge, after listening to the witnesses and my self-defense, closed the first session, asking the prosecutor for other evidence, since todays was not enough? Memorie.al
The next issue follows
