TIRANA, Sept. 14/ATA/ During the joint press conference with the Albania’s Prime Minister Edi Rama in Tirana, the German Chancellor Angela Merkel expressed her support for the “Open Balkans” initiative, while considering it a cooperation that strengthens the Berlin Process.
“Dear Edi Rama, I would like to thank you as the Prime Minister of this country, that in the first part of the day we were able to hold a bilateral meeting. German-Albania relations are very good, we can further expand the cooperation between the two countries and we have made it clear in many ways,” Chancellor Merkel said.
In her remarks, German Chancellor Merkel wished and congratulated Albania on all the efforts it has made in recent years to restructure its justice system.
“Albania and North Macedonia, have met certain conditions to start membership negotiations. Unfortunately, this was not realized during the Germany’s Presidency of the Council of the European Union due to the veto of Bulgaria, but we have also promised that we will be close to this process as it has invested a lot of energy,” Chancellor Merkel said, while underlining that, “in the light of the meeting of all the heads of governments of the Western Balkan countries, I had the pleasure since the idea of 2014 to initiate a cooperation process, it has already resulted in a very powerful plant.”
“A lot has changed in the coexistence of these countries and peoples. Heads of governments meet regularly and normally with each other, which has not been the case before. Secondly, all cooperation in civil society, youth cooperation in some dimensions has been consolidated,” Merkel said.
Merkel noted that at the today’s meeting, “we also talked about important infrastructure projects, which have already yielded first results. We talked about starting the works on “Peace Highway” project. Another topic to be discussed at the moment that the countries of this region will join the EU, they will also to meet the conditions for the climate change.”
“There are many opportunities for regional cooperation. I also welcome the regional common market project, with 4 agreements, some of them are already being implemented. Some have not yet become part of them, today we have agreed that the more we cooperate in this context the stronger the Berlin process will be. The Berlin process does not replace EU membership.” Chancellor Merkel stressed. //a.i/
