The European Council, consisting of the heads of government of EU countries, failed to approve yesterday the conclusions on EU enlargement. Austria blocked the complete enlargement package because of the inclusion of Turkey, which it, together with the Netherlands and Bulgaria, wanted removed from the final document. Even though the conclusions were not formally adopted,
Today a draft report (PDF) of the conclusions of the Ministers of Foreign Affairs of the European Union confirmed that Albania has to fulfill five conditions before the EU will decide to open accession negotiations: Implementation of the judicial reform and the vetting law; Fight against corruption, especially high-level corruption; Fight against organized crime, especially
A few days ago in the Commission for Electoral Reform, the Socialist Party (PS) has proposed an amendment to the Electoral Code forcing all online media “portals” to register at the Media Monitoring Board before the 2017 elections. In case such website wouldn’t register within a set deadline, the government would have the right to
Speaking at a forum organized in for the International Day against Corruption, OSCE Ambassador in Tirana Bernd Borchardt called corruption an omnipresent blight of Albanian society. His speech addressed the following main points: The Albanian government has made efforts to address corruption issues but more needs to be done – corruption remains a serious problem for the
German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Prime Minister Edi Rama have made a few comments for the media before their official meeting in the Chancellery in Berlin. In her brief statement, Chancellor Merkel spoke about five priorities for the integration of Albania into the EU: the fight against crime, the fight against corruption, the electoral reform according
OSCE Ambassador to Albania Bernd Borchardt emphasized the importance of the implementation of the OSCE’s Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR)’s recommendations for the 2017 elections. At the Forum for the Development of Media Borchardt said that one of the recommendations sought to abolish the transmission of “footage produced by political parties […] in