The Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs, Olta Xhaçka, participated in the National Council for European Integration, where she spoke regarding the EC progress report.

“The most important point is not how the government, or the opposition reads the report, but the fact that this report clearly confirms the progress achieved during the last year, meeting all the conditions to start accession negotiations.

The European Commission position is clear and based on our concrete achievements, reaffirms that Albania fulfilled all the conditions set by the Council in March 2020 and is ready to hold the First Intergovernmental Conference”, said Xhaçka in her statement.

According to her, this objective and technical assessment of the Commission, shows that Albania but Northern Macedonia as well – should have formally started the negotiations.

“The European Union, its member states must act on their yet unfulfilled promises. This promise is not only important for the region but at the same time for the EU itself, especially now that there is no valid reason to further delay the opening of the negotiations. On the contrary, there are more reasons than ever in favor of taking this next step. Reasons related to the perspective of the region, to the future of the EU relation with the region, but also to the image and credibility of the EU.

Just like the EU evaluates our region through these progress reports, so does our region, and other actors that have a different vision for the region than EU itself “, said the minister during her statement.