Immigrants become an electoral issue

TIRANA, May 10 – Voting from the immigrants who are believed to be more than one million, has turned into a hot issue at the electoral campaign at the moment.
Last week the Foreign Minister Lulzim Basha promised his government’s support to Albanian immigrants living in Greece. Meeting with their representatives in Tirana, Basha stressed that the government expects to reach an agreement soon with Athenian authorities regarding social insurance and pensions for Albanian immigrants in Greece. Other priorities are teaching the Albanian language in schools across Greece and visa liberalization.
Also in Tirana, opposition parties met with representatives of the Albanian diaspora, promising them that if the parties win the June elections, they will enable almost 1 million Albanians living throughout the world to vote in future elections. The Socialist Party and its small ally, G99, stressed that money the expatriates send to relatives in Albania amounts to more than the annual Foreign Direct Investment in Albania.