On April 28, US Ambassador Donald Lu, EU Ambassador Romana Vlahutin, and OSCE Head of Mission Bernd Borchardt invited the smaller parties from both the majority and the opposition for a meeting. Although the details of this meeting were not released to the public, several politicians attending the meeting claimed that the ambassadors had tried to convince the
According to the annual report of Reporters without Borders, the freedom of the media in Albania has clear and serious problem, which are mainly cause by the intervention of politics. Albania occupies the 76th place among the 180 countries surveyed and has gone up six places since last year. Nevertheless, Albania continues to be one
In advance of the negotiations that are expected to be held today, Speaker of Parliament Ilir Meta met with EU Ambassador Romana Vlahutin, US Ambassador Donald Lu, and Head of the OSCE Presence in Albania Bernd Borchardt in his offices across from the Prime Ministry and the opposition protest. Ilir Meta has always stated publicly
After the OSCE published its report with preliminary findings about the constitutional referendum in Turkey, calling it essentially unfair and a risk for democracy, Prime Minister Edi Rama has congratulated Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on his resounding victory. Turkish press service Anadolu reports that the Albanian Prime Minister placed the call yesterday evening. It appears that Prime
The preliminary findings of the OSCE’s International Referendum Observation Mission paint a grim picture of the constitutional referendum in Turkey, which were held “on an unlevel playing field” without both sides in the campaign having “equal opportunities.” Because of the state of emergency that was declared after the failed coup in July 2016, “fundamental freedoms
At the end of 2006, Edi Rama decided not to enter the local elections, to be held on January 20, 2007, unless three non-negotiable conditions were fulfilled, one of them being the postponement of the elections: The postponement of elections in order to give more time to the citizens to verify their names on the
During an interview with Dritan Hila of Ora News, President Bujar Nishani confirmed that he will not decree the amendment t0 art. 449 of the Criminal Procedural Code, which was recently approved by Parliament. The amendment led to protests from civil society, calling upon the President to withhold his approval of the law, which was
A recent OSCE-ODIHR Needs Assessment Mission Report about the upcoming parliamentary elections of June 18, 2017, warns against the influx of criminal money into the elections. The OSCE-ODIHR further expresses its worries about the difficult political situation in the country, vote buying, and the non-transparent financing of political parties. Ignoring to the recommendations of the OSCE-ODIHR
In an interview with RTSh, MEP Eduard Kukan declared that “holding elections without the participation of all the political parties, with abstentions or boycotts of opposition party is not in the favor of anyone in Albania.” He warned that “this will be very bad for the country, independent of who wins the elections. […] It
In spite of Prime Minister Edi Rama’s promises that he is willing to look at the Electoral Code and the opposition’s calls for electoral reform, the chances are very slim that any significant reform will be implemented before the elections of June 18. Apart from the recommendations of the OSCE-ODIHR and the strong request of