“Amnesty is an act of the sovereign, it is an act of forgiveness and humanity. Of course, these are delicate bills that interfere with the work of an independent justice system, and therefore one of the main principles of this amnesty is the protection of the public interest. It is not the first amnesty that has been granted in Albania,” he told a media briefing after the government meeting.

Manja emphasized that “we have followed the parliament tradition of approving such laws, by tradition the amnesties were approved on the eve of the end-of-year holidays.”

“It is not good to break this tradition. It makes no sense to condition the vote for such an important draft law as over 700 convicts and over 2,500 on probation, or over 1,500 others who could have their prison sentence commuted, are looking forward to this vote by the Members of the Albanian Parliament as a vote of humanity and desire. They received the punishment for the crime committed. Most of the sentence has been served as it is about an amnesty that forgives a part of the sentence,” he said.

“It would be a pity if the vote of the Members of the Parliament, be them from the left or right wing, is conditioned by petty political agendas. The relationship with the voters, with the citizens is the same for us in the majority and for those in the opposition. Amnesty is one of the draft laws proposed in response to multiple proposals that we, as the Minister of Justice, have also received from the opposition MPs. I hope and believe that each of the members of the Assembly will consider the vote for amnesty as an act of forgiveness for a certain category of our society,” said Manja.

/r.e/sm/