Albania

Prime Minister Sali Berisha said Serbia’s threat to remove a memorial to ethnic Albanian fighters in the Presevo Valley breaks international law.“In every free country it’s the local authorities and not the central government that decides which historical or cultural monuments to erect,” Berisha said in a statement on Sunday. …

Customs in the port of Durres on Wednesday sequestered a container with contraband cigarettes coming from Singapore with an estimated value of €500,000.Media reports said customs agents became suspicious about the cargo after the company that had ordered the shipment failed to carry out customs procedures for several days. Inside …

Opposition Socialists says the city’s first urban plan in more than two decades will destroy its few remaining green spaces.Tirana city council on Sunday, after a heated debate, approved the city’s first urban plan since 1989. The plan was adopted with the votes of centre-right Democratic Party, to which Mayor, …

Ethnic Greek minority leaders in Albania have urged Greece not to scrap their pensions as part of the austerity drive imposed by the IMF and the EU.“We understand the difficulties that our fatherland is passing through and support the efforts of the Greek government and its people to strengthen the …

Albania on Friday said it had recognized the anti-Assad opposition as the only legitimate representative of the Syrian people.“Albania calls on the United Nations and NATO to take all the necessary measures to stop the barbarian massacre being carried out by Bashar Al-Assad and his regime against the Syrian people,” …

Data published on Thursday by Albania’s National Institute of Statistics, INSTAT, show that in the 2011 census ethnic minorities make less than 1.5 per cent of the population.According to INSTAT the ethnic Greek minority now accounts for only 0.87 per cent of the population, ethnic Macedonians make up 0.2 per …

Government and the opposition exchanged accusations on Wednesday after the EU Council of Ministers rejected Tirana’s bid for candidate status for the third year.Prime Minister Sali Berisha told the cabinet he blamed the opposition leader Edi Rama for the failed bid, accusing the Socialists of blocking the reform process. “Rama …

Adriatik Llalla started work as Albania’s new general prosecutor on Monday after MPs from the ruling Democratic Party voted him into office on Friday.“I was trusted to lead this institution … and will fulfill the duties subscribed in law,” Llalla said at the ceremonial handover from his predecessor, Ina Rama. …

Albania’s announcement that it plans to offer speedy citizenship to ethnic Albanians across the world has stirred huge interest in Kosovo while ruffling feathers elsewhere in the region.Kosovars have been crowding outside the Albanian embassy in Pristina in larger numbers than usual lately, in the hope of obtaining an Albanian …

Burning Macedonian flags in Albania, and pelting the Macedonian Prime Minister’s car, were unacceptable incidents, the Presidents of Macedonia and Albania agreed in Montenegro.Macedonia’s President, Gjorge Ivanov, and his Albanian counterpart, Bujar Nishani, met on Wednesday at the sidelines of the fourth regional presidential summit under the working title, “Cooperation …