Albania

The Socialist Movement for Integration, LSI, announced on Saturday, that it had accepted a request from right-wing incumbent Prime Minister Sali Berisha, to join the ruling coalition after last Sunday’s poll. Speaking at a press conference in Tirana, the LSI head and former Socialist Prime Minister Ilir Meta said that …

TIRANA, Albania The Central Election Commission (CEC) decided on Thursday (July 2nd) to bring the last voting boxes from the Lezha and Fier regions and count the ballots live on national TV in Tirana. The final results are expected late Friday. Voting has been contested in Shkodra, Berat and Fier.

Albania’s former Deputy Transport Minister Nikolin Jaka, was found innocent by an an appeals court in Tirana on Wednesday, after formerly being convicted of illegally influencing a public tender. Jaka was charged in September 2007 with illegally fixing a series of tenders for road projects, and back then was sentenced …

The Union for Human Rights, PBDNJ, which represents the ethnic Greek minority in Albania, rejected on Thursday speculation that it will return to the governing coalition of Prime Minister Sali Berisha after Sunday’s parliamentary elections. “We will not change our position,” said in a press conference, the party boss Vangjel …

FOR months the opinion polls suggested that Albania’s election would be close. Most pundits said they were wrong, because respondents were giving unreliable answers. Now Albanian opinion polling has come of age. So close was the June 28th election that, four days later, the result was still unclear. Albania faces …

TIRANA – Albania’s opposition Socialist Party said on Thursday it was premature for any party to claim victory ahead of the final results of the country’s election the ruling Democratic Party has already claimed it has won. Prime Minister Sali Berisha said he would wait for the Central Election Commission …

TIRANA, Albania Vote counting has hit a snag due to serious disagreements between the major political parties in a couple of regions. The Central Election Commission (CEC) says that with 98% of votes tallied, the ruling coalition headed by the Democratic Party (DP) won 70 of the 140 seats in …

Albania’s Democratic Party claimed victory in Sunday’s parliamentary elections with 99 per cent of the ballots counted. “Our coalition was certified by the people,” Prime Minister Sali Berisha, head of the party, told a cabinet meeting on Wednesday. “EU integration will be the most important issue in the next four …

Nations in Transit for 2008, a report published by the US-based rights watchdog Freedom House, has criticised Albania for failing to uphold the separation of powers between politics and the law. The report says the separation of powers between the legislature, executive, and judiciary remains fragile and is intermittently damaged …

The new Swedish Presidency of the European Union warned Albanian political leaders that it was carefully monitoring the aftermath of Sunday’s parliamentary elections. “The final assessment of the elections will depend, to a significant extent, on the conduct of the vote count, the aggregation of results, and the handling of …