Concerns grow over Albanian-Greek relations

TIRANA, Aug 11 – Relations between Greece and Albania are deteriorating rapidly over multiple issues, according international relations experts.
With the change in government, there were hopes for a thaw in relations which had remained frozen for several years, since the Albanian Constitutional Court voided an agreement the maritime border, but more recent problems relating to Albania’s new territorial and administrative division, which is opposed by the ethnic Greek minority, have come to the surface.
Last week, an investigation over the maritime border agreement between Albania and Greece was announced, with the Tirana prosecutor’s office looking into possible criminal charges on Albanian officials who negotiated the agreement in 2009. It was later considered as unconstitutional by the country’s highest court.
The main conservative newspaper in Greece, Kathimerini, which provides an analysis of the relations between the two Ionian neighbors in an article this week, says the investigation is another step in the wrong direction in the bilateral ties.
“Greece’s hopes of agreeing an exclusive economic zone in the Ionian Sea with Albania have been dealt another blow after the prosecutor’s office in Tirana launched an investigation into the agreement between the two countries,” writes the newspaper.
Diplomatic sources in Athens told Kathimerini that the launch of the probe was a major setback to moving forward with the agreement and that relations between Greece and Albania are becoming increasingly strained.
There have been only a few moments of full cooperation and peace in the bilateral ties between Greece and post-communist Albania since 1990 despite the fact that about one million Albanians reside in Greece.
They have been a main resource of income for many families in Albania too. But remittances have drastically fallen recently. A central Bank of Albania report showed that during the first quarter this year there had only been 116 million euros sent as remittances from Albanian immigrants back home, the lowest figure of these years.
Greece is looking for oil in the Ionian Sea in an area which also coincides with the one covered from the maritime border agreement in 2009, which is why Athens is keen on finding a solution to the maritime border issue as soon as possible.