Eurasia Press & News
A second day of protests by Bulgarian university students, environmental activists, farmers and pensioners ended peacefully outside the parliament building on Thursday, a day after demonstrators clashed with police and 158 people were detained. The January 15 protest, advertised by organisers as an outlet to express discontent at the way …
Read More »Panama Recognizes Kosovo
Panama has officially recognized Kosovo as an independent state, Kosovo’s ministry of foreign affairs said on Friday. This makes Panama the 54th country to recognize Kosovo, whose Albanian majority seceded from Serbia on February 17 last year. The United States and most European Union countries have already recognised it. Panama’s …
Read More »Albania SAA Ratification Process Complete
Greece’s ratification of Albania’s Stabilization and Association Agreement, SAA, with the European Union on Wednesday was the final step in the formal approval process of the key document by all EU member states, paving the way for Tirana’s application for EU candidate status. Prime Minister Sali Berisha said last week …
Read More »Macedonia Protests Over Greek Minister Comments
Skopje has officially protested at the European Commission in Brussels over comments by the Greek Culture Minister that Macedonia will soon dissolve and be carved up between a ‘Greater Albania’ and a ‘Greater Bulgaria’. Macedonia’s mission in Brussels condemned the statements by Antonis Samaras as “counterproductive” for bilateral relations, and …
Read More »North Kosovo Violence ‘Crime-Linked’ – EULEX
The violence in Kosovo’s Serb-populated north earlier this month was not explicitly political but linked to crime, said the chief of the European Union’s police and justice mission in Kosovo. Most of the120,000 Serbs who live in Kosovo among two million Albanians reject the territory’s declaration of independence from Serbia. …
Read More »Kosovo ‘Not Free’, Bosnia, Macedonia Partly
The 2008 Freedom House report classifies newly-independent Kosovo as a “not free” country, while Albania, Bosnia, Montenegro as well as European Union-candidate Macedonia are only “partly free”. Freedom House is a United States-based international NGO that conducts research and advocacy on democracy, political freedom and human rights. Its annual survey …
Read More »Serbia To Extend Gas Imports To Jan 20
Serbia said it will import gas from Hungary and Germany until Jan 20, and hopes to raise the amount by 2 million cubic metres to cover its needs until the row between Russia and Ukraine is resolved. The country’s energy ministry said Serbia had sufficient crude oil to keep the …
Read More »Bosnia To Treat Wounded Palestinians
Bosnia has offered to accept and treat Palestinians wounded in Israel’s incursion into Gaza, officials said, with the first medical air lifts be expected “very soon.” The health minister of the Bosniak (Bosnian Muslim)-Croat Federation, Safet Omerovic and the Palestinian ambassador to Bosnia, Rostom Amir Saker Hussein, met on Tuesday …
Read More »Albania Issues New IDs, Biometric Passports
Albanians rushed to apply for new identity cards and biometric passports, a key requirement for future visa-free travel to the EU. The new documents are seen as crucial to avert election fraud in the upcoming parliamentary election in June. They have also been one of the conditions of the European …
Read More »Albania to Hold General Election on June 28
Albanian President Bamir Topi has set June 28 as the date of Albania’s parliamentary election, a crucial test of democratisation that will be watched closely by the European Union. Albania has yet to hold elections that meet international standards, with all six general elections since the collapse of communism in …
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