Italian, Bulgarian premiers discuss Transport Corridor 8, Albania included

SOPHIA, Jan. 16 – Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi made a visit to the new European Union member Bulgaria to discuss bilateral ties and European policies with his Bulgarian counterpart Sergei Stanishev. They agreed to speed up work on infrastructure projects to create a transport corridor 8 crossing the Balkans to link Western Europe and the Middle East. Albania is very much interested in this corridor. “We must link the Adriatic and the Black Sea to create a really strong economic zone” in southern Europe, Prodi said. The plan which also includes Albania and Macedonia envisages the construction of missing links in a 1,300-kilometer (800-mile) route of highways, railways and port infrastructure linking Italy’s Adriatic port of Bari with the Bulgarian Black Sea port of Burgas. The corridor is meant to provide a faster connection between Western Europe and the countries of the Middle East and the Caucasus region.