Conversation with the Albanian Attorney General and Others
(November 15, 1963)

Mao Zedong (hereafter referred to as Mao): A warm welcome to you, comrades. How many days have you been here?
Aranit Çela (hereafter referred to as Çela): Ten days.
Mao: Did you come by the northern route or the southern route?
Çela: We came most recently from Korea. We stayed in Korea for a month, on vacation. We traveled to Korea via the northern route.
Mao: They let you pass through?
Çela: They let us pass through, but gave us the cold shoulder.
Mao: The cold shoulder! Please have a cigarette. (The foreign guest says: I don’t smoke.) The Korean comrades are very good; their work is done very well.
Çela: We think so too.
Mao: Over the past few months, the struggle against revisionism has developed further throughout the world. You have firmly stood your ground and achieved victory. Your country is surrounded by them. You are a great inspiration to genuine Marxist-Leninists all over the world. When you return, please send my regards to your leading comrades, to Comrade Hoxha, Comrade Shehu, and other comrades.
Çela: I will certainly convey them.
Mao: Please have some tea. In addition to Comrade Hoxha and Comrade Shehu, there are also Comrades Kapo, Alia, Balluku, and others. Please convey my regards to them as well.
Çela: I will certainly convey them.
Mao: How was your harvest this year?
Çela: Our harvest situation this year is as follows: Last winter there was too much rain, which led to a poor summer harvest this year; but this year’s spring plowing and planting were done well, so the autumn harvest is good. It can be said that this year is a good harvest year.
Sofokli Baba Vangjeli (hereafter referred to as Vangjeli): This year’s weather has been favorable for our autumn plowing and planting.
Mao: Very good. This year we had some disasters, but generally speaking, production has increased. If not for the drought in the south and the floods in the north, this year would have been a bumper harvest. Last year’s output increased by ten million tons compared to the year before. This year, agriculture in many socialist countries has been poor.
Çela: When we came, we passed through Budapest. We heard that the people there are very discontented and have complaints. Their harvest this year was poor, and the government bought grain from the United States. When we were there, the people had not yet been told; perhaps they have been told by now.
Mao: Are you returning home soon?
Çela: We are currently scheduled to leave China on the 26th.
Mao: Today is the 15th. Will you still be going elsewhere?
Zhang Dingzhu (hereafter referred to as Zhang): They will also go to Shanghai, Hangzhou, Guangzhou, and Kunming, and will leave China from there to return home.
Mao: Good, go and see those places.
Çela: We will see many things. Your comrades have been very helpful to us.
Mao: It’s an exchange of views.
Çela: It has helped us.
Mao: Mutual exchange of experience. When you Albanian comrades come to China, the Chinese comrades are all very welcoming.
Çela: We have seen this concretely. Although we already knew in Albania that you would welcome us, here we have seen it with our own eyes.
Mao: Is this your first visit to China?
Çela: It is the first time.
Mao: Are both of you engaged in political and legal work?
Çela: No, I am a judicial worker, and he (pointing to Vangjeli) is an inspector in the Party Central Committee.
Mao: Have you not gone to see the Northeast?
Çela: Time is limited. We stayed in Korea for a month, so there is not much time left. Now we want to use this time to see southern China. To visit every part of China is a difficult task.
Mao: I have just returned from the south. The autumn harvest in the south has not yet completely ended; it is probably about finished now, though Guangdong may not have finished harvesting yet. Will you be going to Guangdong this time?
Huang Huoxing (hereafter referred to as Huang): They will go to Guangzhou.
Mao: In dealing with counter-revolutionaries and with embezzlers and wastrels, relying solely on administrative and legal methods will not work; we must rely on the strength of the masses. It is better when the procuratorates, courts, and public security departments coordinate with Party work and mass work. For instance, as for those guilty of extravagance and waste or embezzlement, generally speaking, they cannot be properly rectified by administrative means alone; they are afraid of the masses. This is called attacking from above and below simultaneously, leaving them no way out.
We must conduct rectification every few years. Even if not once a year, it should be done once every few years. For example, in an organ with dozens or hundreds of people, some problems will arise after a few years. There still exists a fairly serious class struggle in our country. We did not pay attention to this issue for the past ten years. Starting last year, we plan to spend a few years focusing on the issue of class struggle and other related issues; otherwise, things will be very difficult to manage. There are remnants of the old bourgeoisie, and new bourgeois elements are also emerging—those engaged in speculation, embezzlement, and so on. These people are the social basis for revisionism. If we do not rectify this now, in another ten-plus years, revisionism will emerge in China. Of course, their numbers are relatively small, probably around a few percent.
We mainly do not rely on arresting or executing people; we mainly rely on criticism and education. But this does not mean we will not arrest or execute a single person.
For those guilty of the most heinous crimes, whose crimes are enormous and whom the masses demand be arrested, they must be arrested; there are a small number of elements who engage in sabotage, such as murder, arson, destroying factories, destroying bridges, and so on. As for ordinary saboteurs who oppose socialism, such as those who spread rumors and the like, if they are not serious saboteurs, we do not arrest them but rely on the masses to supervise them and reform them through labor. It seems this method may be a relatively good one. Our experience is for your reference; conditions vary from country to country, so act according to your actual situation. We believe you will do even better.
Judicial work is not easy to do. The procuratorates, courts, and public security departments are all instruments of dictatorship.
Çela: Comrade Mao Zedong, we have discussed some issues with your comrades, and they also took us to visit a Beijing prison, where they introduced us to many situations. We feel that your work in educating people is done outstandingly well.
Mao: It is not done well in every place.
Çela: It is possible that your work still has shortcomings, but the foundation is correct.
Mao: It is about using educational methods to reform people.
Vangjeli: We feel we have benefited greatly from this method you use.
Mao: First, we must trust the masses. Second, these counter-revolutionaries are a labor force. If we arrest and execute them, their families and production teams lose this labor force. Third, it makes it difficult to work with their children, as their children would hate us. So, by using educational methods to reform them, this can be avoided. We believe that by relying on the masses, we can educate and reform them successfully; they are also a labor force that can participate in social production. In this way, we can also do a good job with their children and family members, so that they do not hate us.
But the work is not done well in every place. There are some comrades who are impatient and like to solve problems with simplistic methods. They are quick to arrest people or demand their execution. These comrades pass the contradictions upward, from below to above. The method of passing contradictions upward is not a good one; it is difficult for the higher levels to handle. It is better to leave them among the masses, educating them on the one hand and letting them work on the other. As for a small number of elements—did you not visit the Beijing prison? Those must be arrested, but they are also reformed through educational methods.
Which prison did they visit?
Huang: The Beijing Municipal Prison.
Mao: Do those people have work to do?
Huang: There are plastics factories, shoe factories, sock factories, and so on there.
Mao: They learn skills, so after they are released, they can work well.
Çela: We think this is very correct. In the labor reform camps in our country, there is also some labor, but it is not carried out as extensively as you do. Our prison work is weak; although the number of people held in our prisons is very small—only those who are extremely dangerous. Even so, we must still adopt educational methods for such people.
Mao: Correct! First, we must believe that people can be reformed. Under certain conditions, under the conditions of the dictatorship of the proletariat, generally speaking, people can be reformed. Only a very few individuals cannot be reformed. That does not matter much; when their sentence expires, release them, and if they engage in sabotage again, arrest them again. Some are released once and continue to sabotage; released a second time, they sabotage again; released a third time, they still want to sabotage. There are such people. In that case, we have no choice but to keep them indefinitely, putting them to work in the prison factory. Or we may also move their family members here; some who have completed their sentences but are unwilling to return home have their family members brought here.
Zhang: When their sentence expires, their family members can be brought here and they can be settled in employment.
Mao: Yes, settled in employment. Some people are unwilling to return home themselves because their reputation back home is bad, and they already have many acquaintances here. In such cases, their family members can also be brought here, which is equivalent to relocating. There are quite a few such cases.
Huang: In that Beijing prison, there are also those who are employed, over four hundred people.
Mao: We have also reformed an emperor to a considerable extent.
Çela: We have heard of him; his name is Puyi.
Mao: I have met him here. He is now over fifty years old. He now has a profession, and I heard he has remarried.
Çela: I heard he also wrote a book called "The First Half of My Life."
Mao: This book has not yet been publicly released. We feel that his book is not very well written. He portrays himself as too bad, as if all the responsibility were his. Actually, it should be said that this was a situation under a certain social system. Under that old social system, it was logical for such an emperor to emerge. However, we still need to keep an eye on this person.
Shall we conclude here? Let us take a photograph now!