"Enver" engraved into a mountainside in Berat, Albania. Wikimedia. Public domain.The morning medical exam on April 9, 1985, went better than on previous days. Enver Hoxha, Albania’s unchallenged leader for 41 years, took a stroll in the garden of his villa with his wife, Nexhmije, leaning on a walker for support. But around 10:00 a.m. Nexhmije rang the alarm from the bedroom. The special team of doctors, permanently on call, rushed in, giving Hoxha oxygen and electric shocks to restart the heart. They succeeded, and the signs looked good at first. But Hoxha’s kidneys, ravaged by diabetes, had deteriorated beyond repair. Doctors kept his heart beating for two days, but they knew Hoxha had no chance. Just after midnight on April 11, a second heart attack struck the fatal blow.
Five hours later, the loudspeaker sprang to life in the cold cell at Burrel prison. The prisoners rose from mattresses on the floor and shuddered in the mountain air. Prison life had a plodding routine—roll call, breakfast, political class, work—but this day seemed different. Instead of news from the state-run radio, a funeral song filled the air.
Some of the men in Burrel prison had committed common crimes: theft, assault, or worse. But many of the 250 men were there for crimes of the mind: they had dared to question the dominant role of “the Leader.” They had written poems, listened to Western music, complained of poor food, or tried to escape on foot or by raft, or their relatives had committed these treasonous acts and Hoxha was making the family pay. In the prison’s centre stood a special wing for former communist leaders, men who had fallen from Hoxha’s good grace, swept away with an iron broom.
