  We determine from Polyakov loop correlators the screening masses in the
deconfined phase of the (3+1)d SU(3) pure gauge theory at finite temperature
near the transition, for two different channels of angular momentum and parity.
Their ratio is compared with that of the massive excitations with the same
quantum numbers in the 3d 3-state Potts model in the broken phase near the
transition point at zero magnetic field. Moreover we study the inverse decay
length of the correlation between the real parts and between the imaginary
parts of the Polyakov loop and compare the results with expectations from
perturbation theory and mean-field Polyakov loop models.
