Organized by the Kosovo State Archives Agency (ASHAK), the exhibition “The Time of Transformation – Kosovo 1986-1981: Documents and Testimonies” opened today in Prishtina.
Acting Prime Minister Albin Kurti said that the demonstrations of 1968 and 1981 paved the way for a chapter in which a student movement transformed into a social revolution advocating the rights of the oppressed and discriminated Albanian population during the former Yugoslavia, KosovaPress reports.
“In the spring of 1981, during March and April of that year, first the students of the University of Prishtina and later workers and large sections of the population rose in a series of protests, marking another pivotal event in the modern history of Kosovo,” Kurti said.
He added that the history of these years can be read through the documents displayed by the Kosovo State Archives Agency.
“By looking at these documents, we see how important it is to invest in our archival institutions, both in infrastructure and technology, while also cultivating a culture of archiving as an institutional tradition. The archives of our state not only show us what the past was through documents and recordings, but also encourage our society to keep more records and document more for those who will come after us, just as those before us did for our generation,” Kurti said.
Kurti emphasized that the state archives, besides showing what the past was through documents and recordings, also encourage society to maintain records and document for future generations.