Prime Minister Rama met today with President of the European Parliament Martin Schulz. At the end of the meeting, Prime Minister Rama and EP President Schulz spoke to the media:

Prime Minister Edi Rama: It was a pleasure that our dear friend, the President of the European Parliament Martin Schulz came in Albania as he promised.

It was also a great pleasure that we were able to talk about the progress made in terms of the process of modernization, democratization and integration of our country into the EU, and the challenges ahead, among which justice reform is a top challenge for this year and to which, as you know, we are fully committed. We will definitely pass this reform in fall and give the EU a strong signal of our will to transform Albania once and for all and to make it a country willing to become part of the European family.

EP President Martin Schulz: Thank you very much, Mr. Prime Minister! As you just said, it was a real pleasure for me to keep the promise I made to come to Albania, in Tirana, for the first time. I left Munich this morning, a few minutes after an agreement on Greece was reached in Brussels. I am really pleased and happy for this agreement, because it will enable us to avoid a deeper crisis in the EU.

Actually, it was really a good thing, because the crisis would affect Albania as well. That’s why this is good news for everyone, and it enables us to continue our work on another package on Greece, in order to help the country solve its problems, and basically move on.

Mr. Prime Minister and I had a very good and open meeting. I can even say that we agreed, not almost on everything, but on everything.

I would like to mention especially two things which in my view are important. The first one is the extremely positive role that Albania plays in the region, and in particular I would like to thank and honor Mr. Prime Minister for the role he and his government play in this field. I would also like to thank Mr. Prime Minister and Albania for the very clear support to the European Union in terms of our relation with the Russian Federation. These are very difficult relations, yet Albania has maintained a very clear support for the European Union, which means that it has been in line with the European Union.

I would like to thank Mr. Prime Minister particularly for showing me this wonderful building. Mr. Prime Minister showed that he is indeed a man of art, an artist who appreciates art or, as French say, “un homme de haut goût.