Prime Minister Edi Rama kicked off the second day of his trip to the Western Balkan countries with a visit to Sarajevo. After bilateral meeting with the Chairwoman of the Council of Ministers of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Borjana Krišto, the two issued press statements.

 

Chairwoman of Council of Ministers of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Borjana Krišto: Hello everyone!

I would like to welcome the Prime Minister of the Republic of Albania, Edi Rama.

Our meeting focused on our good relations, with both of us agreeing that no pending issues exist between the two countries and that bilateral relations should further strengthen in the coming years.

The cooperation should include dialogue and I am looking forward to enhance bilateral cooperation in the future.

At the meeting, I informed the Prime Minister of the Republic of Albania about the current political situation in the country and the way how political issues work here.

Our two countries need to engage in good dialogue and I am hopeful that both countries will cooperation regularly on the current political situation in our region.

We focused on 14 important issues we need to forward to the European Commission.

We have determined five issues we should forward and the Council of Ministers will prepare to best and adequately present these issues to the European Council on July 19. The issues include regional cooperation under the Berlin Process in particular.

To this end, we have informed President about the measures and the initiatives we have launched as part of the Berlin Process and the Summit due to be held in Tirana.

We have still to adopt two more initiatives regarding the free movement and the single common market. We are working on these two initiatives and will soon become a reality.

Prime Minister of the Republic of Albania, Edi Rama: Thank you very much for the hospitality and for helping to make this visit within a very short notice thanks to the commitment of the Chairwoman of the Council of Ministers.

First of all, I congratulated the Prime Minister in the consensus to ban smoking in this very building and I very much hope it will set an example for making and implementing all the decisions and the very processes that are crucial to our common welfare. We are looking forward to further strengthening relations with Bosnia and Herzegovina and I also informed the Prime Minister about our ongoing preparations to open the embassy of the Republic of Albania in Sarajevo.

Bosnia and Herzegovina is home to an Albanian community and I am very glad to state that Albania’s Bosnian community enjoys linguistic, cultural and religious rights guaranteed by the Constitution of the Republic of Albania and the law on minorities in Albania.

On the other hand, it is not a secret that the Republic of Albania also defends interests of Kosovar Albanians in other countries and I told the Prime Minister too that we want the free movement with the ID cards only be provided to Kosovo citizens under the Berlin Process agreements, including the free movement accord, because it is pointless to face such problems, while politics should primarily serve all citizens without distinction.

I really hope that just like Serbia has signed such agreements, Bosnia and Herzegovina follows the lead too.

On the other hand, I m here to brief the Chairwoman of the Council of Ministers on what we should do at the Berlin Process Summit in Tirana in October and how we are seeking to work on a joint position of the Western Balkans six to make use of the Tirana Summit as a gathering that would materialize the new EU funding and economic support plan for these 6 countries.

We have embarked on this effort since the day when the accession talks with the EU were opened and we are pleased to see a level of sensitiveness on the EU side and a process already announced by the European Commission President von der Leyen is underway to provide new support as part of the effort to further strengthen regional cooperation in the Western Balkans.

We certainly understand and fully back the EU support for Ukraine and no comparison lines can be drawn, yet it is also important that a new approach is pursued towards the Western Balkans six. I don’t think that a war should be waged or we should face an aggression so that we can gain more support.

The EU should enhance its support for the region and demonstrate that good conduct is rewarded, the readiness to build peace is rewarded and the readiness to leave the past behind and embrace the future together is rewarded.

I also informed the government head of Bosnia and Herzegovina that an informal meeting with the leaders from the region and European Commission officials will take place by mid-July in Tirana to discuss the new EU support package and build a shared position regarding the Berlin Process in order to strengthen cooperation with German Chancellery and turn Berlin Process into a more productive machine.

Once again many thanks for the hospitality! 

I would like to congratulate you on your election and wish good luck and as much consensus and harmony as possible among you!