Croatia’s six- month EU presidency (January-June 2020) came to an end on June 30. Among other things, it was during this time of the Croatian presidency that the decision for Albania to start EU accession talks was announced in the Zagreb Summit.
Croatia, Albania’s strategic ally, led the EU in the outbreak of the dreadful coronavirus pandemic and managed to mobilize the missing cohesion of Union’s member states to co-operate in dealing with the deadly virus when everyone was thinking about themselves. It was an occasion to see that solidarity was an empty words, the borders were closed, the strongest abandoned the poorer countries, including Albania.
It was at this time that Croatia brought its Foreign Minister to Tirana with emergency humanitarian aid when Prime Minister Edi Rama declared in public desperately that Albania was alone at the war with COVID19.
On Tuesday, Croatia handed over the baton to Germany, which, as a matter of fact, praised Zagreb’s presidency for its leadership in these extremely difficult times when, in addition to the epidemic, it was hit by a strong earthquake.
All Albanian leaders, without exception, praised Germany for taking over the EU presidency on Wednesday.
It’s normal to wish Germany success in its task at the helm of EU. But it does not seem normal to ignore the first 6 months of EU’s presidency. At least for courtesy someone could have said a word of appreciation to Croatia, the country during whose presidency Albania made a meaningful step in its drive towards the Union – opening of the pending accession talks./argumentum.al
