Visa liberalization for Albania

TIRANA, March 9 – Council of Europe (CoE) Director for Justice and Home Affairs Ivan Bizjak said that Albania must meet more requirements before it can be offered visa-free travel to EU member countries.
In an interview with Deutsche Welle on Saturday, Bizjak said, “I am sure that both Albania and Bosnia and Herzegovina know exactly what criteria they have to meet,” adding that this stage is just the beginning of a long road to EU membership.
Among areas where more work is necessary, Bizjak cited consolidating institutions, boosting the rule of law, fighting corruption and organized crime, respecting human rights and guaranteeing free competition.
For the moment Albania says it has fulfilled all the road map criteria set by Brussels but there are also rumors that the political domestic fight may turn into an obstacle along this path.
Meanwhile the European Parliament made some decisions Tuesday facilitating the rules on the Schengen visa owners.
They decided that the three-month holders may travel all around the Schengen countries but Britain, Ireland and Denmark that have not accepted such moves.
For the moment all those Albanians who have a longer Shengen visa may travel in all these countries.
The government expects the European Union to likely decide this summer to offer the visa-free regime to Albania.
For the moment there are rumors that the requests from some hundreds of FYROM and Serbian citizens for asylum in Belgium may also damage the prospects for the visa-free regime for Albania and Bosnia.
There are other voices, also coming from the European lawmakers and western governments, like that of Italy, that there should be no obstacle for these two remaining countries in the western Balkans to enjoy the visa free regime.