General Director of the Albanian Telegraphic Agency (ATA) Valbona Zhupa and General Director of BTA Kiril Valchev signed the agreement in Sofia. The agreement stipulates that the two news agencies undertake to exchange one selected news item on a daily basis and publish it.

“This will ensure that by the end of each year we have 365 news items from each other,” Valchev said as he signed the document with his ATA counterpart.

Valchev said it was not normal for two countries so close as Bulgaria and Albania to learn about each other through international news agencies such as the Associated Press, Reuters, AFP, DPA and not use the local sources.

The BTA Director General noted that in September Bulgaria will host the 30th General Assembly of the Alliance of Balkan News Agencies – Southeast Europe (ABNA-SE), where there will be proposed the same news exchange practice among all Balkan agencies.

“There is also a Bulgarian minority in Albania about which the Albanian state takes special care of and we rely on our colleagues from ATA to get more news about Bulgarian nationals in Albania,” Valchev said.

On her part, ATA’s General Director Zhupa stressed that the diplomatic relations between Albania and Bulgaria have existed for about 100 years and there is wide cooperation in many fields.

Zhupa underlined that the economy and tourism should have a special significance in the exchange of news items between the two agencies.

She added that the cooperation between our two countries in the field of tourism is also reflected in the number of Bulgarian tourists visiting Albania and Albanian tourists exploring the Bulgarian coast.

“Before the pandemic, over 40,000 Bulgarian tourists chose to visit Albania. This figure is very significant for the relations between our countries “, underlined ATA General Director.

Zhupa stressed that the establishment of Tirana-Sofia airline will serve the exchanges between our two countries, especially the increase in the number of tourists, while Albania has lifted all COVID-19 restrictions.

The ATA-BTA agreement also provides for the exchange of experience and journalists between the two news agencies. Valchev said Albania would be the sixth Balkan country where BTA would open an office. The other five are North Macedonia, Romania, Turkey, Greece and Serbia./p.s./