Khoja Enver - biography, facts from life, photos, background information. Enver Hoxha Russian archives Albania in the years of Enver Hoxha

KHODZHA ENVER

(b. 1908 - d. 1985)

Dictator of Albania, an ardent Stalinist.

The poorest country in Europe is a small mountainous Albania. Several decades of Enver Hoxha's rule led her to complete isolation. After the collapse of the regime, the country was transformed, but even today, dilapidated concrete bunkers built throughout the country in case of foreign aggression serve as a mute reminder of those times.

Enver was born on October 16, 1908 in the city of Gjirokastra in southern Albania into a family of employees. There he graduated primary school, and then a lyceum in the city of Korce. From 1930 to 1936, Enver studied in France at the University of Montpellier. He studied brilliantly and graduated from the university with honors. It was at this time that he began to actively engage in communist activities, joining the Communist Party of France, and then the Communist Party of Belgium. His first publications appeared in the press, which clearly traced the formation of Hoxha as a "faithful" Stalinist. He sought to establish contacts with underground communist organizations in Albania and in 1936 returned home. For some time he taught at the Korça Lyceum, at the same time leading a communist group.

1938 turned out to be a significant year for Enver. He was sent to the USSR. There he studied for more than a year at the University of Marx - Engels - Lenin and at the Institute foreign languages, translating into Albanian the speeches and books of Stalin, Molotov, Vyshinsky. At the same time, his first meeting with Stalin and Molotov took place.

In April 1939 Albania was occupied by Italian troops. Although the National Assembly and the government of the country were preserved, both of these bodies were subordinate to the Italian Viceroy. A local fascist party was created, and the Albanian army became part of the Italian one. By decision of the leadership of the Comintern, Enver Hoxha was sent along with two assistants from the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks to Albania. He became one of the organizers of the anti-fascist struggle. For this activity, an Italian court sentenced him to death in absentia.

After the occupation of Yugoslavia by the Nazis, Albanian areas were included in Albania: Kosovo and Metohija. This is how “Greater Albania” arose. "Ethnic cleansing" began there (by August 1942, about 10,000 Serbs had been killed). Meanwhile, with the support of England and the USSR, the resistance movement expanded. On November 7, 1941, the Communist Party of Albania was proclaimed at an underground conference. However, despite all the efforts of Hoxha to achieve a leading position in the party, his rival, K. Dzodze, was elected the first secretary. Enver became his deputy, but received a post that gave him real power - the commander-in-chief of partisan formations. In the summer of 1942, the partisans began an armed struggle against the invaders. In the fall, Hoxha's second meeting with Stalin and other leaders of the USSR took place in Moscow, at which he assured of his readiness to fight to victory and his intention to build socialism in Albania along the lines of the USSR. In the same period, there were changes in Hoxha's personal life. He married 20-year-old Nejimie Rufi, the daughter of an oil worker, who became his associate and assistant in all endeavors.

Since 1943, Enver Hoxha headed the Communist Party (in 1948 it was renamed the Albanian Party of Labor - PLA). At the same time, the successes of the Albanian partisans were indicated. In autumn, they liberated the city of Debar, the center of the Albanian-populated region of Yugoslavia, and hoisted over it state flag Albania - a red flag with a double-headed eagle. This led to the first Albanian-Yugoslav conflict. As the Italian army collapsed, the Germans began the occupation of Albania, managing to split the resistance movement in the process. Then, in May 1944, the Communists created the Anti-Fascist National Liberation Council, and in October a government was formed in which Hoxha, while remaining commander in chief, became prime minister and minister of foreign affairs. At this time, the retreat of the Germans began, and on November 28, detachments of the communists entered Tirana, the capital of Albania. The Communists strengthened their position after the elections to the Constituent Assembly, which legitimized their power.

At the end of the war, a conflict broke out between Hoxha and the leader of Yugoslavia, Tito. Until June 20, 1948, Albania made full use of the financial and military assistance of Yugoslavia to carry out its ambitious plans for industrialization and modernization. Mixed companies were created in the country, Yugoslav specialists and military advisers worked. However, Tito sought to create a Balkan federation under the auspices of Yugoslavia, which was supposed to include Albania. Kosovo and Metohija then became autonomous regions of Yugoslavia. But such an alliance contradicted, first of all, Stalin's plans, as well as Hoxha's plans. The cult of Hoxha was already in full swing. Enterprises began to be named after him; the first five-year plan was introduced, in the creation of which both Stalin and Hoxha participated. Industrialization and the collectivization of agriculture unfolded in the country.

In November 1949 there was a complete break between Stalin and Tito. Stalin called Tito's regime "fascist" and called for his overthrow. Enver Hoxha decided to use this situation to resolve the issue of Kosovo and Metohija in favor of Albania. In a letter to Stalin, he, as if asking the leader of the USSR for advice, wrote: “We believe that Kosovo, Metohija and part of Macedonia bordering Albania with an Albanian population after the liberation of Yugoslavia from the clutches of Tito ... should be annexed to Albania.” Hoxha went to break all relations with Yugoslavia, up to the closure in 1953 of the border. In Albania itself, “purges” began. Hoxha settled scores with an influential pro-Yugoslav group within the PLA, especially with K. Dzodze, who was then Secretary of the Central Committee and Minister of the Interior. He was arrested and executed. Political "purges" continued until the mid-1950s.

Now the Yugoslav influence has been replaced by the Soviet one. Up to 40% of the Albanian budget was received from the USSR. Stalin's death and Khrushchev's speech at the 20th Congress of the CPSU changed Hoxha's relationship with Moscow in many ways. He became wary of the new leaders of the USSR, who saw Albania as their nuclear key to the Mediterranean.

In 1955–1956 in the socialist countries of Europe, the Stalinists began to lose their influence. Rapprochement between the USSR and Yugoslavia began. It was then that Tito demanded the removal of Hoxha from power, who at that time held the post of 1st secretary of the Central Committee of the PLA, having ceded the premiership to M. Shekh in 1954. And soon at the congress of the PLA, the delegates, not without prompting from Moscow, sharply criticized Hoxha and Shekha. Under such conditions, the Albanian leader abruptly changed course, appealing to the Albanian nationalists, calling for "live, work and fight as if surrounded", especially to fight against the growing Yugoslav threat. Soviet slogans of the 1930s and 1940s were adopted. At the same time, the destruction of Orthodox churches began, since Serbs, Greeks, Macedonians and Russians were Orthodox in Albania. By the mid 60s. not a single Orthodox church and not a single living Orthodox priest remained in the country. On the other hand, large-scale construction of reinforced concrete bunkers was launched in case of war. In total, over 700 thousand of them were built during the years of Hoxha's reign. Their cost was 2.5 times higher than the cost of the famous French Maginot Line.

Meanwhile, Hoxha's policy of isolating Albania was gaining momentum. At the International Meeting of Communist and Workers' Parties in Moscow in November 1960, the Albanian leader sharply condemned Khrushchev's conciliatory policy towards the West. The final split between Khodja and Khrushchev took place in 1961.

after the XXII Congress of the CPSU. Diplomatic relations were severed. The following year, Albania withdrew from the CMEA, then from the Warsaw Pact. Hoxha refocused on China, which now provided up to 40% of Albania's budget revenues. Weapons came from China; Chinese specialists helped build power plants, plants and factories, extract ore and oil. Hoxha called all this "the second liberation of Albania." In 1974, he declared: “Let the Soviet leaders kiss us at least three times, as is customary in Orthodox Church but we'll never make peace with them anyway." But when in the late 70s. China began rapprochement with the West, Hoxha broke off relations with it. The country was in complete isolation.

At the same time, waves of repression swept across the country again. Khoja did not forgive even the slightest disobedience. He declared the wavering enemies of the people and the party. In connection with the allegedly uncovered pro-Chinese conspiracy, the "purge of personnel at all levels" began again, which continued until the death of Hoxha. Some improvement in relations with Yugoslavia in 1980 was interrupted by unrest in Kosovo. It came to the mass expulsion of Serbs and Montenegrins from this region. In 1981, Prime Minister Shehu committed suicide, and then there was a report that he was a Yugoslav, Soviet and American agent and therefore was eliminated. New purges began: many people associated with Shehu were executed.

In 1983, Hoxha's health deteriorated rapidly: heart attacks, strokes, diabetes. On April 11, 1985, Enver Hoxha died of another stroke. But for another 5 years, his sinister shadow hovered over the country.

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Khoja Nasreddin in the Soviet way (Akram Yusupov) A. Yusupov was born on May 1, 1905 in a small town near Andijan in Uzbekistan. He was the 9th child in the family of the baker Mammad Yusupov. The family lived in poverty, and Yusupov Sr. had no way to feed all his children.

Having gained independence only 100 years ago, Albania nevertheless has a long history. Rulers often changed here, and the regimes they established sometimes radically differed. And the sights of Albania bear the imprint of the various events that took place on its lands. So, in the center of Tirana, an unusual structure rises - a monumental pyramid made of glass and concrete, which immediately attracts the eye. This is the so-called mausoleum of Enver Hoxha, the former ruler of Albania.

Say a word about poor Enver...

Few people know that one of the toughest totalitarian regimes of our time was installed in Albania by Enver Hoxha. This man, being a convinced communist, dreamed of building socialism. During the years of his dictatorship, Russian-speaking Albanians joked that the capital of their state was named after the tyrant. And in fact, the Albanian leader kept the country in a tight rein for 40 years: religion was banned, as well as everything related to Western culture, the borders were tightly closed, cars and phones became the lot of the elite, the population lived equally poor.

That's all that's left of you...

In 1985, Enver Hoxha died, the country was in mourning for 9 days. After 3 years, according to the project of the daughter of the Albanian leader, a mausoleum was erected, resembling the tombs of the Egyptian pharaohs. A museum of the powerful dictator was opened in the building, it was planned that the remains of Enver Hoxha would also be buried there. However, the "Pyramid", which for a long time was one of the most expensive buildings in Albania, did not fulfill its main purpose. The change in the political situation in the country led to the fact that the museum's exposition was dismantled, and a conference center and a bar with the somewhat cynical name "Mumija" were located in the building itself. Today, the future of this attraction of Tirana is vague: the authorities are planning to rebuild the "Pyramid" into a youth Entertainment Center, then completely demolish the building, reminiscent of the dictatorship of Enver Hoxha.

Peace symbol cast from bullets.

In front of the mausoleum of Enver Hoxha, the Peace Bell is installed, which reminds of the riots that swept across the country in 1997 in connection with the collapse of local financial pyramids. Deceived depositors, wanting to somehow compensate for their financial losses, plundered military warehouses. The bell was cast from spent cartridges, picked up on the streets after the establishment of order, which today is a symbol of a new page in the history of peaceful Albania.

And you can learn more about the past of Albania and Tirana by visiting Gjirokastra - a unique city-museum that combines a fortress, a mosque, and a market.

Enver Halil Hoxha (alb. Enver Halil Hoxha; October 16, 1908, Gjirokastra, Ottoman Empire - April 11, 1985, Tirana, Albania) - Albanian politician, de facto leader of the People's Socialist Republic of Albania in 1944-1985, 1st Secretary of the Central Committee of Albania Party of Labor (1941-1985), Chairman of the Council of Ministers of Albania (1946-1954), Minister of Foreign Affairs of Albania (1946-1953) and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Albania (1944-1985).

The future Albanian political leader was born in 1908. His father was a poor merchant. Enver received his education at the Lyceum for the Humanities, where they taught in French. In 1930, the young man went to France, where he entered the University of Montpellier. He chose engineering. It was in France that Enver became close to the ideas of socialism and communism. Because of this, the Albanian government stopped paying the student a scholarship. In search of work, Enver went to Paris. There he met the editor of the communist magazine L'Humanite. Hoxha wrote articles about Albania for this newspaper. In them, he spoke critically about the government of his native country.

In 1934, Enver received the position of secretary at the Albanian consulate in Brussels. There he studied law. When the leadership of Albania found out about his articles, he was sent to his homeland. So he did not become a full-fledged lawyer. In the town of Korca, where he received elementary education, he began to teach at the Lyceum and at the same time participate in the activities of one of the communist groups. In 1939, his political activism led to Enver being arrested. He was sentenced to a small prison term for subversion. In April 1939, when Italian troops entered Albania, Enver was fired from the lyceum, as he adhered to anti-fascist views. Khoja left for the capital Tirana, where he began selling tobacco. She was only a cover. In fact, Hoxha took part in the underground activities of the resistance movement against the Nazis. In 1941, all communist parties in Albania united. In the same year, the Communist Party of Albania was formed. Enver Hoxha became its general secretary.

A year later, the CPA had quite a few brigades that took part in the resistance movement. In 1944, Hoxha confidently stated that German and Italian troops had been expelled from Albania without the help of the allies. In 1945, the leaders of the USSR, the USA, France and Great Britain recognized the Hoxha government in Albania. Enver began to consolidate his power. He confidently defended the independence of Albania. Opposed the leader of Yugoslavia Tito. In May 1949, Hoxha ordered the execution of communists who allegedly supported Tito. Enver supported the Stalinist regime in everything. The USSR provided enormous assistance to Albania. After Stalin's death, Khrushchev's policy aroused great dissatisfaction with Hoxha. In 1961, financial assistance from the USSR stopped coming to Albania, and a little later, all diplomatic ties between these two countries were broken. Enver made an alliance with Mao Zedong, who also severed ties with the USSR. Now Albania received help from China. In 1968, Albania officially withdrew from the Warsaw Pact. In 1978, China stopped providing aid to Albania. Since Enver began to criticize his government and the US government. Until Hoxha's death in 1985, Albania remained isolated.

Khoja Enver

Khrushchevites

Unknown Albania

All information about Albania was completely inaccessible to the Soviet people. Personally, I first read about this country in the magazine "Young Guard" in 1998, No. 12. I think that before reading Enver Hoxha's book "Khrushchevites" you need to read this article.

Sincerely, Alexander Shabalov.

“…Now most of all they are shouting about glasnost. But there are many topics on which it is not customary to write. I tried to find something about Albania did not work. Maybe the "Young Guard" will break this "conspiracy of silence"?

N. Suvorov. Alma-Ata

The slogan "Live, work and fight as if surrounded" largely determines today's life in Albania, the foreign and domestic policy of the Party of Labor of Albania. The desire of the leaders to save the country from "pernicious bourgeois ideology and revisionism", from frequent revisions of their own history and their own experience, from socio-economic and political "vices" and ulcers generated by "capitalism and revisionism", is embodied in various areas of the economy, in the internal and foreign policy of the country of "true" socialism, in Everyday life Albanians.

Albania, which for a long time received significant economic assistance from the USSR and other CMEA countries, as well as from the PRC, in the second half of the 70s proclaimed a policy of refusing foreign loans and other assistance, which, according to Tirana, threatens the economic and political independence of the "state dictatorship of the proletariat. At the cost of huge material, financial, labor efforts, often 14-16 hour working days, Albania was able to overcome the difficulties caused by the termination of cooperation with the socialist countries. By strengthening economic and political centralization, subordinating all available funds and resources to the cause of “survival in the environment”, making the most of scientific and technical cooperation with many countries (which has never been interrupted), severely punishing incompetence, negligence, bureaucracy, and even more so for “petty” theft (not to mention "large"), Albania was able to ensure economic and political stability and independence, a relatively high growth rate of the gross national product (in the 80s - 10-15 percent per year).

Since the beginning of the 1980s, national production has completely satisfied the demand for grain (the wheat yield in the 1980s was up to 42 centners per hectare), meat and dairy products, clothing and footwear, medicines, and many durable items. Petrochemical, metallurgical, woodworking and other enterprises created in the 70-80s provide the country with 80-90 percent of ferrous and non-ferrous metals, aluminum, agricultural machinery, cars, many types of energy and industrial equipment, oil products, fertilizers, building materials, electric locomotives , wagons ...

Taking as a basis the Soviet experience of industrialization of industry and the collectivization of agriculture, using rich Natural resources(chromium, copper, bauxite, oil and gas, iron-nickel, zinc and manganese ores, etc.), with a small number (3.2 million people in 1988), but selfless and industrious population, the Albanian leadership has carried out and is conducting a course towards creating a fully self-sustaining economy, towards expanding exports not at the expense of raw materials, but of semi-finished and finished products.

Of course, the small size and consumer inexperience of the population to a certain extent restrain the "consumer" orientation of the economy, and self-withdrawal for political reasons from world economic integration, the ideologization of foreign economic relations are unlikely to have a positive effect on the economy, scientific and technological progress of Albania.

Nevertheless, progress is evident: the country, which did not have ferrous metallurgy until the mid-1970s, now produces more than 50 types of steel and 80 types of rolled products. A country that "did not know" its own railway engineering until the 80s, the first railways, which appeared only at the end of the 50s, now exports rails, some types of freight cars. Until the mid-1950s, only 20 percent of its territory was electrified with small diesel thermal power plants, Albania now exports electricity to the People's Republic of Belarus, the SFRY, Greece, Romania, has large hydroelectric power stations in the Balkans, and develops bioenergy, geothermal and solar energy. The country, in which until the 1950s about 80 percent of the population was illiterate, became a society of universal literacy not only for Albanians, but also for Greeks, Serbs, Montenegrins, Macedonians, and Turks living in Albania; has two universities, dozens of universities and research institutes, teaches students from a number of countries in Asia, Africa, Latin America.

If earlier the population of the republic was considered doomed to extinction due to numerous diseases, epidemics, lack of a healthcare system, now it has the most high level the birth rate in Eastern Europe is 33 per 1,000 inhabitants and the minimum mortality rate is 6 per 1,000 inhabitants. The average monthly salary of workers and employees is 730–750 leks (1970 - 650 leks), the payment for an apartment built in the state sector is 10–15 leks, in the cooperative sector - 25–30 leks. (According to the rate of the State Bank of the USSR (1989), 100 leks equal 12 rubles.) Those who have worked at one enterprise for at least 15 years are entitled to an annual free ticket to resorts (with a 50% discount for family members), pay only 50% of the cost of medicines; drug prices are reduced once every 3-4 years. Workers, schoolchildren, students enjoy free meals at the place of work or study, school uniforms and textbooks are also free. Students are paid scholarships named after V. Lenin, I. Stalin. E. Hodzhi (E. Hodzha - First Secretary of the Central Committee of the APL from 1941 to 1985.) Workers and employees to and from the place of work are delivered by state (departmental) transport at reduced rates. The majority of workers spend their annual paid three-week vacation (until the mid-80s - two weeks) at "family-type" resorts.

Men have the right to retire at 65; women - in 60 years. In the event of the death of one of the spouses, the family members are paid the monthly salary (or pension) of the deceased within a year. At the birth of the first child, a woman receives a 10% increase in salary, the second - 15%, while paid (in the amount of monthly earnings and additional payments) maternity and childcare leave is 2 years (including postpartum one and a half years); in case of loss of a breadwinner, a woman receives 125 per cent of her salary for three years.

Marriages with foreigners are prohibited. Since 1986, an exception has been made for "comrades-in-arms and comrades-in-arms in the fight against imperialism and revisionism."

It is noteworthy that in Albania back in the 60s the income tax was completely abolished, and since 1984 the tax on bachelors and small families has been reduced by half. Every summer, following the example of the “Stalinist”, as it was called, price cuts in our country, retail prices for many consumer goods are reduced in the NSRA by an average of 5-15 percent.

But there is, as they say, the other side of the coin. Workers are not allowed to have for personal use objects of "bourgeois luxury" - a car, a grand piano (although a piano is possible), a video recorder, a cottage "non-standard" in size and "recommended" types of development, rent out living space to private individuals (the latter is possible with a "special temporary" permit ). Shortwave radios and radiograms are not manufactured, and possession of imported ones is prohibited.

State farms do not have the right to sell agricultural products on the markets; cooperative farms can sell these products at prices only 10-20 percent higher than the state prices, and state prices have “seasonal” fluctuations and vary depending on the quality of the products. Certain foodstuffs (bread, dairy products, meat products, wool, olives, berries, tea, etc.) are generally prohibited from being sold in the markets. The state, often raising purchase prices, helps to reduce market trade in food.

There are very few foreign journalists in Albania, despite the fact that the NSRA maintains diplomatic and trade relations with 95 states. The maximum stay of foreigners (non-diplomats) in the country is three weeks, and even then they are allowed to visit only a few cities and regions. Such restrictions, it is true, do not apply to representatives of the "parties and movements fighting against the imperialists and revisionists", on the contrary, their visits are welcomed in every possible way, widely covered in the press, on radio and television.

The list of taboos does not end there. Long hair, jeans and tight trousers, imported skirts, cosmetics, "bourgeois-revisionist" films, rock music, jazz, etc. - all this is strictly prohibited. Numerous cases are known when visiting foreigners, even if they are "sincere friends" and "true communists", without ceremony, are sent right at the airport to hairdressers or to an "urgent" atelier. Those who resist are sent back...

Enver Hoxha Career: Minister
Birth: Albania, 10/16/1908
Enver Hoxha (alb. Enver Hoxha, October 16, 1908 April 11, 1985) First Secretary of the Party of Labor of Albania in 1941-1985, Chairman of the Council of Ministers of Albania in 1944-1954. and Minister of Foreign Affairs in 1946-1953.

Khoja was born in the town of Gjirokastra in southern Albania. His father, a fabric merchant, was always traveling around Europe, as a result of which his uncle, Khysen Khoja, was mainly involved in education. Hisen Hoxha was a fierce supporter of Albanian independence (Enver was four years old when Albania gained independence) and a fighter against the repressive policies of the governments that ruled the country after gaining independence. Enver was strongly imbued with the ideas of his uncle, especially after King Zogu came to power in the country in 1928.

In 1930, Hoxha entered the Montpellier University in France, where he studied on a state scholarship, but was soon expelled for poor performance. From 1934 to 1936 he was secretary of the Albanian consulate in Brussels, and also studied law at the local university. In 1936 he returned to Albania and began to teach in Korca.

Hoxha lost his teaching job in 1939 following the occupation of Albania by Italian troops for refusing to join the Albanian Fascist Party. He opened a tobacco shop in Tirana, which soon became a meeting place for a small communist group. With the help of the Yugoslav communists, in November 1941 he created and led the Communist Party of Albania (hereinafter the Albanian Labor Party), and in addition the resistance movement (National Liberation Army), which came to power in November 1944.

Social and economic reorganizations

Hoxha declared himself a staunch Marxist-Leninist and admired the personality of Stalin. He built his power on the Soviet model, and when his former allies the Yugoslav communists ideologically parted ways with Moscow in 1948, he broke off relations with them and a year later executed his main political opponent, Defense Minister Koçi Xoxe, on suspicion of activities in favor of Yugoslavia.

At the direction of Khoja, the lands were confiscated from wealthy landowners and united in collective farms (cooperatives), while the landowners themselves were imprisoned and destroyed. Albanian political work arrogantly declared that communist Albania had fully provided for its food needs, developed industry, electrified most of the rural areas, and eradicated illiteracy and disease.

When the iron curtain was lifted with the fall of the communist regime, a completely different picture appeared. Albania was not in the least that industrially developed, avant-garde country, as communist agitation activities claimed. In fact, it was a backward power, by the standards not only of Western capitalist countries, but also of the countries of the Eastern Bloc, such as Bulgaria and Romania. The vaunted developed industry of Albania turned out to be a fiction, in agriculture the methods of the last century were used, and telephone communication, which had long since come into use in neighboring countries, remained a curiosity for all Albanians, except for the highest officials of the Communist Party. The wages of workers and the order of life were strikingly low by the standards of any European country, which led to the mass emigration of Albanian workers to neighboring Greece and Italy, where, moreover, as illegal immigrants, they lived better than at home.

Despite the constant splurge, perhaps Hoxha's only real legacy was an unthinkable complex of 600,000 concrete bunkers scattered throughout the country (numbering 3 million inhabitants), which were planned to be used as observation posts and artillery firing positions. At the same time, which is typical, about half of them were directed not against an external enemy, but against Albanian cities and villages. This manifested the paranoid essence of Hoxha's personality, the one that feared the American invasion aptly in the same way as the revolution in his own country.

Stalinism. Severance of relations with the USSR

Hoxha remained an ardent Stalinist and later like N.S. Khrushchev at the XX Congress of the CPSU in 1956 accused Stalin of massive violations of socialist legality. This meant the isolation of Albania from the rest of the European socialist countries. In 1960, Khoja took the side of the PRC in the Sino-Soviet conflict, and the very next year broke off relations with Moscow. In 1968, Albania withdrew from the Warsaw Pact in response to the entry of troops from the Warsaw Pact countries into Czechoslovakia. The only Warsaw Bloc country with which relations were maintained was Romania, whose leader, Ceausescu, condemned the invasion of Czechoslovakia.

Hoxha's domestic politics followed the Stalinist model he admired, and Hoxha's personality cult in Albania bore a striking resemblance to the personality cult of the Soviet leader, whom he considered his ideal (moreover, military uniforms and insignia were copied from Stalinist-era Soviet designs). Domestically, the Sigurimi Albanian secret police used repressive methods borrowed from the KGB and the East German Stasi. Every third Albanian either served time in the camps or was easily interrogated in Sigurimi. In order to eradicate freethinking, the authorities resorted to systematic purges of opponents of the regime, they fired them from their jobs, sent them to hard labor and, moreover, executed them. Travel abroad was allowed only for business purposes, so as not to dispel the myth of the avant-garde economy of Albania. Any manifestation of individuality or creativity in cultural life was stifled in the bud, art and literature could be present only to the extent that they were necessary for the dissemination of government propaganda.

Until the end of the 1980s, the cult of Stalin was preserved in Albania, the town of Kuchova was named after him, Stalin's works were reprinted (including in Russian), the birthdays and deaths of Stalin were officially widely celebrated (as well as Lenin's days, and the anniversary of the October Revolution). Already after the death of Hoxha, in 1986, on the occasion of the death of V. M. Molotov, national mourning was declared in Albania.

The ideological enemies of the regime were called Khrushchevites and Titoites; they were credited with communication with the authorities of the USSR and Yugoslavia, which bordered Albania. The use of these labels was similar to the Trotskyists in the USSR in the 1930s.

Atheist campaign

In 1967, after two decades of increasingly violent persecution of the church, Hoxha loftily proclaimed his country the first atheist state in history. Inspired by the Chinese Cultural Revolution, he confiscated goods and buildings of mosques, churches, monasteries and temples. Many of these buildings were immediately razed to the ground, while others housed workshops, warehouses, stables and cinemas. Parents were forbidden to give their children church names. Anyone who found the Koran, the Bible, icons or other objects of religious worship, was sentenced to long-term imprisonment.

As Amnesty International reported in its 1984 report, the human rights situation in Albania was downright deplorable. Hoxha's regime deprived citizens of freedom of expression, religion, movement, and association, although all these freedoms were formally guaranteed in the 1976 Constitution. In fact, certain articles of the Constitution legally restricted the exercise of political freedoms that were considered contrary to the established order. In addition, the order limited people's access to every information other than that which was distributed by the state media. Sigurimi continuously violated the inviolability of the person, home and correspondence and made illegal arrests. The judiciary rendered its decisions on the basis of political expediency, without giving the perpetrator the opportunity to present evidence in his favor, and often without any judicial formalities at all.

Break with China. Complete isolation

The death of Mao Zedong in 1976 and the defeat of the Gang of Four in the subsequent intra-party struggle in 1977-1978 led to the Sino-Albanian conflict and the complete political isolation of Albania, while Hoxha accused both Moscow and Beijing of revisionism.

In 1981, Hoxha carried out a new purge, executing several party and state officials. It was reported that his close associate for 25 years, Prime Minister Mehmet Shehu, committed suicide after another conflict within the Albanian leadership in December 1981, but it is often suggested that he was actually killed.

A few years later, Khoja retired from business, handing over a large number of them to Ramiz Alia. After the death of Hoxha on April 11, 1985 (at the age of 76, a smooth month after Gorbachev came to power in the USSR), internal and foreign policy Albania became less rigid due to the general crisis of the communist system in Eastern Europe. In Albania, this led to the abandonment of the one-party system in 1990 and the defeat of the reformed Socialist Party in the 1992 elections.

Compositions

* E. Hodge. Khrushchevites

* Archive of works by E. Hoxha (English)

* Speech at the Meeting of Communist and Workers' Parties, 1960 (Spanish).