German ambassador says fair play needed for EU integration

ELBASAN, June 8 – German Ambassador Bernd Boschardt, speaking at a meting in the central city of Elbasan, said that corruption in Albania remained a big problem and that integration into the European Union meant a continuous and tangible fight against that phenomenon.
Bochardt said that fighting corruption remains one of the main criteria the European Union had considered on the visa-free regime and will do in the future for the application as a candidate status.
The ambassador also said that the political crisis should come to an end and that only then the tiny Balkan country should expect to get the candidate status from the bloc.
Tirana has applied for the candidate status since last year. Earlier this year it completed thousands of responses to the questionnaire from Brussels and expects to get a positive answer this year.
Bochardt made it clear that the political crisis played a big role in the country’s efforts of integration into the European Union.
The political crisis in the country now will make it more difficult for the European Commission to give a positive answer to the candidate status request.
Bochardt also said that the country had still to complete some benchmarks for the visa-free regime roadmap. That meant the fight against crime and corruption and confiscation of the assets of the criminal gangs and persons.
But he also expressed his belief they would be completed in the mean time and by the end of the year Albanians would be free to move without visas to the EU Schengen countries.
On the political conflict between the governing democrats and the opposition Socialists, Bochardt said that Europe expected a solution within the constitutional framework and also based on transparency of the vote.
He played with words comparing that with the football game. He said Albanian political leaders should play the game perfectly well in order to score at the European Union goal.