Czech Republic supports Albania’s integration efforts

TIRANA, Nov 3 – The Czech Republic has made it quite clear that it wants Albania to become a NATO member next year and also a European Union member in the future, but it also urged the tiny Balkan country to speed up its required reforms.
The Czech Chamber of Deputies supported Albania and Croatia’s entry into NATO when it agreed last week, in a first reading, with the ratification of the protocols.
Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg defended the two countries’ accession saying, “This will contribute to the stabilization of the Balkans.” He said NATO entry also brings in foreign investment, which also happened in the Czech Republic when it became a NATO member in 1999.
“Money is the most cowardly thing in the world, therefore investors go only where they feel completely safe,” Schwarzenberg told the lawmakers before landing in Tirana last weekend.
NATO invited both countries to its summit in Bucharest last April. The ratification process in member countries should be completed so that both countries might enter NATO at its next summit in April 2009.
The minister also made it clear that Albania deserves to become an EU member. However, he said visa liberalization needed much more work, as did reforms, and it was unlikely to happen during his country’s EU presidency in the first half of next year.
Albania’s holding of general elections next year will be a precondition for that work.
That statement was in contradiction to what was said by the Italian Foreign Minister, Franco Frattini, who said Italy would sign the visa liberalization at the end of the first half of next year.
Shwarzenberg said that western Balkan integration into the EU would be a priority for his country while holding the EU presidency. He said their motto was a Europe without barriers.