Students in Albania Vow to Start Hunger Strike Over School Name

Students in Albania’s capital will start a hunger strike today unless authorities drop the name of the late Stalinist leader Enver Hoxha from the university there, state radio said.

The broadcast said leaders of an 11-day-old boycott at the university in Tirana announced the hunger strike after Education Minister Skender Gjinushi met with university officials and later refused to meet any of their demands.

Thousands of students throughout Albania have been boycotting classes since Feb. 6, demanding the resignation of the communist government and other political and economic changes.

“They . . . made known to (Gjinushi) their decision to go on a hunger strike unless a positive reply is given to their demands by 11 a.m. Feb. 18,” the radio said.

Albania, which was the last bastion of Stalinism in Europe, has been swept by change since student protests began in December.

President Ramiz Alia has slowly been reversing the isolation created by Hoxha, his predecessor. Alia bowed to earlier popular protests and allowed opposition political parties to be organized.

Last week, he warned striking students that he would not give in to them and called their boycott action undemocratic.

The radio said that Gjinushi told the student leaders that changing the name of the university should be left to the new Parliament to be chosen March 31.