Kosovar president visits road link to Kosova

TIRANA, Nov 5 – Kosovar President Fatmir Sejdiu, accompanied by his host counterpart Bamir Topi, visited Tuesday the road link to his homeland.
Both presidents made a visit at the Rreshen-Kalimash road segment considered to be the most difficult.
A U.S.-Turkish joint venture signed a 418 million euro contract with Albania in October to build a 60-kilometer road segment, including a 6-kilometer tunnel, by June 2009. The joint venture includes Bechtel International Inc., based in San Francisco, California, and Istanbul-based Enka.
Sejdiu said that road was one of the dreams of the late Kosovar President Ibrahim Rugova.
Sejdiu also said that road link could also be accompanied with the lifting of the use of passports for the citizens in both countries.
Sejdiu said that the Durres-Morini road linked it with Kosova but also further toward central Europe.
Kosovo, a U.N.-run province in Serbia, is important to Albania because most of the tourists visiting the western Balkan country are ethnic Albanians from Kosovo or Macedonia as well as expatriate Albanians returning from other parts of Europe.
The road will serve to link Albania with Kosova, Serbia and central Europe, and that region with Western Europe through the port of Durres.
The road will also help fight poverty in Albania’s poorest northeastern area which it crosses. Albania, one of Europe’s poorest countries, has hopes of one day joining the European Union and NATO.
The new road will be about 45 kilometers shorter than existing roads and will shorten the travel time _ which can now take up to six hours _ to two hours.