
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, March 24, 1992                   TAG: 9203240044
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-4   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: TIRANA, ALBANIA                                LENGTH: Short

OPPOSITION WINS ALBANIAN ELECTION

Tens of thousands of Albanians cheered Monday as an opposition leader hailed his party's election victory as the end of a "very deep sleep" under Stalinist power.

The Central Election Commission said Monday that the Democratic Party had captured 76 of 97 electoral districts in this poor, mountainous country wedged on the Adriatic Sea between Greece and Yugoslavia.

With a two-thirds majority, the Democrats could change the constitution to force Socialist President Ramiz Alia out of office. Aliz has completed one year of the five-year term the last parliament gave him.

Isolated for decades by its hard-line leadership, Albania in 1990 became the last of the Communist states on the European continent to introduce reforms and throw off one-party rule.

The last year has been one of massive hardship. There are few jobs, riots have broken out at warehouses distributing foreign food donations, and people in the cities often go without heat or electricity.

The United States and other Western diplomats support the Democrats, meaning the new government is likely to attract more foreign aid and technical assistance.

According to the election commission, the Socialists, former Communists, captured only five seats Sunday, with 26 percent of the vote compared to the Democrats' 64 percent. The Socialists had easily won last year's elections, Albania's first multiparty vote since World War II.

The huge gains by the Democrats reflected disillusionment over the economic crisis and breakdown in law and order.

by CNB