Albania lobbies for Kosovo

TIRANA, June 18 – Last week Albania took part at a summit of the South East European Co-operation Process (SEECP) held in Belgrade, Serbia which it tried to exploit as a moment to lobby for the new country in the Balkans, Kosovo.
It was not successful.
Albania refused to sign a declaration from the forum saying that Kosovo was not mentioned in accordance with the EU’s positions.
Albania official said that they could not accept a draft resolution as it did not included Kosovo as an equal member and thus to be in line with the EU’s position.
Tirana has lobbied hard for Kosovo’s recognition and it is in a continuous work for that.
In the Balkans it is still hard to convince Serbia to accept Kosovo as an equal partner. That means that regional meetings are often disrupted when Serbian or Albanian officials do not accept the presence or the lack of Kosovo there.
It will be very hard to reach that status.
Meanwhile Kosovo is recognized by 91 countries since I declared its independence a few years ago.
The meeting elected Goran Svilanović as the new Secretary General of the Regional Cooperation Council (RCC), effective as of 1 January 2013 for the period of three years. Svilanović succeeds Hido Biڦ#269;ević, who has been serving as the first RCC Secretary General in two mandates since 1 January 2008.
The RCC Secretary General emphasized that the RCC, as an operational arm of the SEECP, needs to preserve its status neutral and all-inclusive character, with a stronger alignment with the EU enlargement strategy, just as it should be attributed stronger implementation tools in order to enhance its ability to respond effectively to the emerging socio-economic challenges in South East Europe.