TIRANA, June 15, 2022 – The prime ministers of Albania and Montenegro were in Kyiv on Wednesday, following an invitation from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Albania’s Edi Rama and Montenegro’s Dritan Abazovic voiced their support for Ukraine and publicly called for the European Union to speedily grant candidate for membership status to Ukraine. Their call was also joined by North Macedonia, whose prime minister delivered a remote address at the meeting.
“All three countries believe in Ukraine’s European future,” Albanian Prime Minister Rama said at a joint press conference with Zelenskyy and Abazovic.
All three Western Balkan states are NATO members and EU candidates, and they have denounced Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and joined the sanctions against Moscow.
Some EU officials had expressed concern that speeding up Ukraine’s EU integration would be unfair to the Western Balkans, which have been waiting for decades in their EU membership process, a view not shared in the region and in Kyiv, according to the public statements during the visit.
“Our countries are not competing with each other on the European path,” Zelenskyy said.
But the history of the two Western Balkan countries serves as a timely reminder of the complexities of EU membership for Ukraine, which is aiming to become an EU candidate at next week’s meeting as it faces Russian aggression. North Macedonia was granted this status in 2005, and Albania was granted it in 2014, but the EU has yet to initiate membership talks with either nation, a lengthy delay that has led to great frustration.
The two prime ministers also visited areas in the outskirts of Kyiv where the Russian invasion killed civilians and destroyed homes and infrastructure.