During a mutual press conference with Albania’s Chief Negotiator with the European Union Zef Mazi, the EU Commissioner for Home Affairs Ylva Johansson asked from the Albanian political parties to take responsibility for the integrity of the names that will be proposed as candidates in the next general parliamentary elections. “All parties of course should take their responsibility to make sure that there is a high integrity standard of all the candidates on the lists so that we should together also continue convincing member states and building trust in the area of security and rule of law,” said Johansson.
The EU Commissioner stated that both the countries should continue together “to fight organized crime, to stop financing of terrorists, to manage migration together. We need better police cooperation, we need better detection and protection of our external borders.” The EU Commissioner took the opportunity to praise Albania for “all the good progress” that has been made especially in the last year, adding that “we can see that all conditions now are met for holding the first intergovernmental conference on EU association negotiations with Albania. This of course has to be confirmed and decided by the Council, but this is the recommendation from the Commission.” The Commission mentioned also a lot of areas where there is a need for improvement, such as the problem with unfounded asylum seekers, which was discussed also between Johansson and Prime Minister Rama, in a meeting they held earlier in the day. According to the Chief Negotiator Mazi, the Prime Minister and Johansson talked about the need for further cooperation on many sectors between Albania and the European Union, such as the police sector, the justice institutions, the border control, and better management of the migration issue.
After the conference, Johansson met also with the leader of the opposition Lulzim Basha, who took the opportunity to share with the Commissioner the plan of the Democratic Party to fight the organized crime and corruption.
