TIRANA, June  8 /ATA/ Prime Minister Edi Rama, in his address to the ceremony of conferring the  “Doctor Honoris Causa” title on Federica Mogherini by the University of Tirana, expressed his gratitude to her  for everything she has done for Albania, for Albanians and for the region as a whole.

“The university has made a meaningful and commendable gesture by awarding this title to Federica and including her in the ranks of those world renowned names that the rector cited. If I were to single out Federica from that list, I would do so keeping in mind her personal and continuous commitment in support of Albania, in support of our efforts to move faster down the path of European integration, in support of our need to have the voices that helped us and help us for making our case, in relation to what is a daily court that judges our work and results, which is Brussels in this case and it goes without saying  for her exceptional commitment in the interest of peace, of normalization and increase of cooperation in the region,” Rama said.

Rama said that “I believe that Federika is one of those many personalities and representative figures of the European world who have engaged with this region, with our country, but she is one of the few who has performed this task, in relation to us and the region more than what is expected from them. She did it as an expression of a political passion and a civic drive, as a humble, courageous European, holding firm convictions through to the end about the benefit of the European Union and the necessity of a complete European Union with all the peoples of Europe as part of it.”

“I am really glad that Federica will come to Albania more often, now as the director of the College of Europe, because in fact we have hit the ground running for the College of Europe in Tirana, which will be the third branch of the College of Europe headquartered in Bruges, one wing is in Poland and the other wing will be in Albania.”

It’s an incredible news for us. Something that would have been very difficult to imagine only a few years ago, that Albania would become the country of the College of Europe, and definitely the credit for this goes to Federica, who has strongly supported this idea,” said Rama.

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