Albanian political parties have finally reached an agreement on electoral reform.
The reform was one of the several conditions set by the EU to be met before the start of accession negotiations.
Representatives of all major parties in the Political Council have agreed on the following points on Friday:
The Socialist Party has conceded to the opposition and has abandoned its proposal to dismantle the politicized election administration. It has instead agreed to maintain the current electoral committees with party representatives.
There was an agreement to use biometric identification across the country. However, it is possible that biometric identification will not be able to be implemented at all in the next election given the short time until the expected April or May elections.
Judges in the Electoral College shall be elected from those who have passed the vetting process successfully.
The parties did not agree with MP Rudina Hajdari’s proposal to change the electoral system.
The Albanian diaspora, which amounts to about half of the population living in the country, will still be unable to vote.
The opposition gave up on its request to have a caretaker government set-up before each general election.
