Prime Minister Edi Rama took part in the Euronews EU Enlargement Summit, an important televised event organised by Euronews, bringing together leaders of EU member states and candidate countries as a new dialogue platform to discuss the future of the European integration process.
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Now, as we promised, we would talk to all the leaders involved in this process, and there is one country that we’ve not spoken with yet, and that is Albania, but you heard it from the Commissioner herself, countries she believes are the frontrunners are Albania and Montenegro.
So, on that note, I’m happy to say we are now joined. He could not be with us today for, well, things that happen in politics, a last-minute situation, but he is with us now. It’s the Prime Minister of Albania, Edi Rama, who will join us now online.
-We are going to continue the EU enlargement talks at this historic EU enlargement summit, and yes, indeed, last but certainly not least. The frontrunner country, here we go, Edi Rama, Prime Minister of Albania. Thank you very much for joining us. Can you hear me?
Prime Minister Edi Rama: Yeah, I can hear you.
Good evening, and sorry to not be able to be with you. It was not political; it was a technical air problem that I had nothing to do with, but I couldn’t take the plane.
Well, we hope next time you’re going to be able to join us here in person. And for today, we thank you for joining us here online for this New Year news format. This is 12 Minutes with Edi Rama, Prime Minister of Albania. Thank you for being here. As you heard today from the report and from Marta Kos, indeed, Albania is one of the frontrunners, and the accession negotiations reached unprecedented momentum this year, with preparations for the opening of the last cluster before the end of the year now, quote, well advanced. Now this report seems very positive for you. What’s your take on it?
Prime Minister Edi Rama: Yeah, the report is very positive, and the whole year has been extremely positive. We have opened five of six clusters within only 11 months, which is an absolute record in terms of speed. It’s something that, until only a few years ago, we’ve been able to imagine. But this is why life is so beautiful.
-So what’s the secret? Why don’t you share this secret with other candidate countries? What was that, you know, key factor? What was your secret in speeding it up so much then?
Prime Minister Edi Rama: Well, beyond the platitude that it’s hard work, I would add that the speed is related to two main factors.
On one hand, during the what I call years of humiliation, which were the years when the EU Commission was recommending to the Council to open accession talks with Albania, and we were rejected by a few countries, we stubbornly prepared for the moment of the opening, and we trained in the hardest way with all our team by simply saying to ourselves our moment to show our true colors will come. And for that moment, we have to be ready. And as a matter of fact, when the moment came, we were much more advanced than maybe others in that precise moment of the opening.
-Well, given that this has indeed been a very long process for Albania, it has been 16 years altogether, you’ve previously spoken about the shifting goal posts by Brussels.
Do you feel like this has changed, and there is this new push, and this situation is over for Albania, but also for the other candidates from the region, because they have also been waiting for a very long time?
Prime Minister Edi Rama: Here comes factor number two, which is exactly Brussels, that changed its approach and woke up. Unfortunately, it was needed an aggression in the European soil, military aggression to make Brussels wake up, not simply at the level of the Commission, where we have always found fairness. Yes, very painful, very neurotic, but fair. But also in the level of the council, where the blah, blah, blah of before that, yes, one day we’ll be together, yes, we love you, yes, we’re going to marry, but we are not ready to talk for the moment, was over. And a new momentum is still here, and the new approach it’s still the case.
I hope that this will not fade away. And I very much hope that we will finally get together around the same table.
-Yeah, I was about to ask you about whether, you know, whether this momentum and this situation of more serious commitment as you described there, whether it is going to last. Albania is now considered one of the front-runners.
Your goal is to enter the EU by 2030. How do you also see this situation with the shifting goalposts by Brussels changing or possibly not changing for the other countries in your region?
Prime Minister Edi Rama: I didn’t get the last part of the question.
-I will repeat that, Prime Minister. You said that indeed there is a big…
Prime Minister Edi Rama: What I said I know, but I don’t know what you said.
–The question was, do you feel this change by Brussels also now being implemented and being seen by the other countries in your region?
Prime Minister Edi Rama: Well, for this, you have to ask Brussels, but as far as I am concerned, I might tell you that 2030 is not a date that I saw in a dream, but it’s a deadline that is the result of a very simple calculation.
We start from the fact that together with the Commission, in full consensus with the Commission, we have agreed on a calendar that is very ambitious, but it’s doable, of homework for us to conclude the accession talks, the negotiations at the end of 2027.
There is a possibility to do it even faster, let’s say in the first half of 2027, and there will be reasons for that, but let’s say end of 2027.
The average time we have looked into when it comes to the 27 parliaments to ratify the decision is around two years, and this is how we envisage Albania to sit around the table of the EU in 2030, but of course, we are not at all against being there faster.
Now, when it comes to the region as such, I would fully agree, and I echo the words ofDavid McAllister previously, who said this is a very merit-based process. Everyone has their own path, and everyone has to fulfil their own obligations and to do their own homework, and there are different characteristics in the region, there are different countries, different histories, and so on and so forth. When it comes to us, I can say with a very loud voice that we are the most Euro-optimistic nation in Europe, or as Donald Trump would say, on earth.
-Prime Minister, there is a specific focus as well by Brussels, this is slightly on the downside, probably of the report, with the focus from Brussels coming regarding the issue of corruption.
What I want to ask you is that Albania is the first country in the world to appoint an AI as a government minister, specifically tasked with fighting corruption.
Would you give us an update, how Diella is doing? How is her, and your fight going on?
Prime Minister Edi Rama: Before going to Diella and her fight, let me remind you and everyone who has the patience to follow this long day of yours, for which I am very grateful, that Albania is doing something unseen and unique in the whole region.
Our justice reform and our recognition of the not only de jure, but also the de facto independence of justice, and the full-fledged operation of a special structure against organised crime and corruption has practically created in Albania and for Albania the example that the fight against corruption is something that goes very, very much beyond words, very much beyond makeups, and it goes very deep and it goes very, very, let’s say, balanced without looking left, without looking right, independently from who is in government, who is in opposition, who was in power, who is in power, and with a lot of facts that show that what never happened in Albania from the day of independence and creation of the Albanian state in 1912 to until very few years ago, it’s happening the last year.
Something that no other country in the region can claim to have done. And this is not to say that we are better than the others, but this is to say that we have taken it very seriously. And in this moment in time, we accept support, we accept partnership, we accept help, but we don’t accept lectures from anyone when it comes on the fight against corruption.
When it comes to Diella, she is the product of a systemic fight, which is not just about fighting cases and fighting in the court of law, but which is about fighting through modernisation.
We aim to have by 2027 the first full AI public procurement that will allow speed, transparency, and accuracy at levels that are unseen.
-Prime Minister, finally, let me ask you to wrap this up. What is the next creative idea and the next creative solution coming from you and from Albania on your way to the European Union membership?
Prime Minister Edi Rama: I’m sure you have heard that Diella is pregnant and she has 83 babies based on the last ecography. So, we have to wait for her to give birth to these 83 babies.
In the meantime, I have to tell you one thing that has not been much discussed, that we are the only country in this process to use artificial intelligence in the transfer of the acquis communautaire to our body of law, and to make of it the fastest process ever made in terms of not only translating, but also analyzing the impact and drafting and preparing the whole legal packages for the approval in Parliament.
So, we are trying to run as much as possible and to make as many as possible leapfrogs using technology, artificial intelligence. But without never, ever forgetting that our place in Europe is first and foremost deserved because Europe has the best place in the heart of the whole Albanian nation. Something that the others cannot pretend.
-Prime Minister, I have to follow up.
Do you think Brussels could use an AI commissioner?
Prime Minister Edi Rama: It’s not for me to tell Brussels what to do, but of course, I would be very happy to introduce Diella to whoever on the EU side will introduce him or herself like an AI commissioner or an AI technocrat or bureaucrat or whatever else. It doesn’t matter.
-Prime Minister, thank you very much for this interview and for your time. And thank you very much for joining us here. That was 12 Minutes with Eddie Rama, Prime Minister of Albania.
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