By Ambassador of Italy to Albania Sabah D’Elia
Italy and Albania are tied together in a privileged partnership, based on strong economic, cultural and social ties that are nurtured on a daily basis by new experiences and a new spirit of cooperation. This special rapport led our respective premiers to the signature on February 12th of a Solemn Act that will institutionalise the strategic partnership between our two countries.
This is a deeply rooted partnership: Italy has contributed determinably to Albania’s development through initially emergency interventions and then through structural assistance for socio-economic development. In the course of 20 years this assitance has amounted to more than one billion euros.
The progress Albania has marked in terms of political and economic governance has thus determined the country’s accession in NATO. Albania’s greatest challenge now is EU integration and Italy will certainly continue to play its traditionally strong supportive role towards the achievement of this historical aim too.
These, as well as many other dimensions of our bilateral relations will inspire the Great Season of Activities “Italy and Albania 2010: Two peoples, one sea, one friendship” that will take place during spring, starting on the 14th of March, organised by the Italian Embassy, in close cooperation with many other Italian and Albanian institutional and private actors.
The Season foresees a wide array of activities throughout Albania, many initiatives starting from cultural activities to conferences on topical issues, to sports events. This ‘Long Italian Spring’ actually foresees eighty activities on culture, sports, the environment, infrastructure, education and development.
More concretely, it is the office of Italian Cooperation of the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs that will be celebrating its 20th anniversary of activity in Albania. It is in this occasion that a series of inciting activities will be held, dedicated to this key sector of international assistance to Albania. Among these activities there will also be a journalism competition for the selection of the best documentaries and reportage of Italian Development Cooperation initiatives.
Two series of important international conferences will discuss pertinent issues of Albania’s European perspective: the 8th Corridor, the essential infrastructure to facilitate movement and to bring the Western Balkans closer to the European Union; the Instrument for Pre-Accession Assistance as the EU’s financial instrument to support countries aspiring EU membership during the pre-accession phase.
A special edition of the “Fiera del Levante” – The Levante Fair – and the Italian Festival, organised by the Italian Institute for Foreign Trade, will bring to Albania the excellence of the trade mark “Made in Italy” and Italy’s gastronomic richness. Italian culture will be more present through exhibitions of classic and contemporary art, concerts and theatre performances. There will also be events on Italian cinema, one of which will be dedicated to Giuseppe Tornatore.
Events targeting youth have also been planned, such as the dance show of the internationally known group Kataklo’ who have brought their original performance to exclusive events such as the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games and the festival of Sanremo 2010.
This Great Season of Activities will give us all an opportunity to constructively reflect upon future challenges and common strategies to face them. In this sense, our respective civil societies represent crucial resources and ideas. This is the purpose of the forum that will be established under the title “The Dialogue between Italian and Albanian Civil Societies”. This forum will be a permanent platform to serve the accumulation of reflections and to contribute to the processing of responses to salient issues of common interest.
“Italy and Albania 2010 – Two peoples, one sea, one friendship” is part of the great activities of the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs for the promotion of Italian culture abroad during 2010-2011. The aim of this season is to open up new perspectives for the development of the wonderful rapport between Albania and Italy.
