Washington expresses concern about Albania

TIRANA, June 7 – US Deputy Assistant Secretary Thomas Countryman spoke at a press center in Washington on the developments in the western Balkans. During the conference he emphasized that “the United States’ commitment in the Western Balkans is firm. We’re working ever more effectively with our partners in the European Union to help all of these states achieve the goals they have, which is membership in the European Union and, for many of them, membership in NATO as well.” He hailed the arrest of Ratko Mladic from Serbia as, “a step towards candidacy for the European Union.” He hailed Macedonia’s “free and fair, not perfect but attaining high standards” elections. However with regard to Albania, he expressed uncertainty. “We have continuing concerns about the situation in Albania. I praise the citizens of Albania for their high participation and their dignified conduct of elections in Albania last month,” he said. Countryman hailed “an extraordinarily strong performance by the people of Albania.” “Elections do not belong to one party or another; they belong to the people,” he said. We’ve expressed our doubts about the legal basis for the decision by the Central Election Commission to count a certain category of ballots,” said Countryman. The US top official reminded Albanian political parties to “act with the same dignity that the people of Albania showed – keeping calm, respecting the law, not seeking to provoke violence.” He said that all of these issues must be addressed by the Electoral College. “We reserve judgment on the results until we’ve heard their final opinion.” Countryman was more open also on the Albanian politicians. “We have not seen enough political leaders who are willing to put the national interest of Albania ahead of the interest of their particular party,” he said. “What’s in the national interest of Albania today is demonstrating, especially to the member states of the European Union, that Albania can function like any other democracy that is seeking to join the European Union. And in the last couple of years, it has not been meeting that criterion.” “What I fear today is that what should be a very positive demonstration to Europe, to Brussels, to all the member states of Albania’s political maturity Šinstead of being a positive signal, it can turn into a negative signal if there is not a genuine effort by the parties to approach this issue in a calm and constitutional way.”