Fuele seeks more work in integration

TIRANA, May 3 – European Union Enlargement Commissioner Stefan Fuele holds a visit to Tirana during which he met with all top officials and leaders there to clarify that integration into the bloc needs much harder work.
Albania is expecting a positive answer to its candidate status request it made three years ago and which has already received two negative responses in the previous years.
This year it starts with the consensual president, expected to be elected by the end of June or in early July.
Officially Fuele will visit Albania, more than a year since his last visit, to discuss reform efforts and progress in the EU agenda with his Albanian counterparts. He will meet President of the Republic Bamir Topi, Speaker of the Assembly Jozefina Topalli, Prime Minister Sali Berisha, Foreign Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Edmond Haxhinasto, Ombudsman Igli Totozani and Chairman of the opposition Socialist Party Edi Rama during his one-day stay in Tirana.
Fuele will also speak in the Assembly, addressing the members of parliament on topics important for the countryճ accession to the European Union.
This visit follows an intense sequence of meetings between the European Commission and Albanian representatives.
Fuele has made it clear that it is up to Albania whether it will get the status or not. That means that Albania should work to fulfill the 12 key recommendations set on the western Balkan country in the last two years. That means political cooperation, starting with the consensual president and on the reforms required in the integration progress. It means the independence of the judiciary and also that of the media and the rule of law, fighting organized crime, illegal trafficking and corruption.
These have been some issues which Fuele and other European officials, lawmakers and also the EU’s Ambassador in Tirana Ettore Sequi continuously make present in any occasion, ceremony or activity they take part.
A consensual president also means who is going to elect the next head of the secret intelligence police Shik and the next prosecutor genera. It means who is going to reform the country’s judiciary, its Achilles heel in the post-communist period.
That call also comes at a time when the country is already involved in a media debate on the next president.
Fuele’s visit, a normal one in a candidate country, was also covered by his presence and speech at the parliament. That speaks of the importance Europe gives to the parliament, a warning that it should neither be abused by the governing Democrats nor be boycotted by the opposition Socialists.
The joint work of the two main political parties is of special importance for the electoral reform. They are expected to give an end to their project soon and that should give a new impetus, a good basis to, at last, hold free and fair elections next year.
Sequi made it clear again to Albanian Integration Minister Majlinda Bregu that Tirana should lose no more time for tangible results in the integration process this year. He called on both political groupings to continue and also carry out results of the November agreement which is focused on the electoral reform and the parliament’s rules. Sequi said that European integration is a process that involves everyone, not only the government and the opposition, but also all the other social groups and the population.