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Albania is committed to joining the European Union by 2030, Prime Minister Edi Rama told Euronews, labelling his country as “the most Euro-optimistic nation in Europe”.
“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,” he said during his interview at Euronews’ EU Enlargement Summit on Tuesday.
He expects to conclude talks in the next two years, giving national parliaments across the EU another two years to ratify the decision, he added.
The timeline is considered assertive by both Albania and the European Commission, or as Rama said, “ambitious but doable”.
The European Commission’s annual check-up of where the EU candidate countries stand in the accession process came out largely positive for Albania.
Brussels stated that the talks with Tirana “reached unprecedented momentum” this year. Rama told Euronews that Albania’s key to success goes beyond “the platitude that it’s hard work” and also requires commitment from the EU, and not only from the candidates.
The Albanian prime minister expressed hope that this momentum would not fade and that his country would finally take its place at the EU table after “years of humiliation”, during which the process was stalled due to a lack of interest by Brussels and individual member states.
“Unfortunately, an aggression was needed on European soil, a military aggression, to make Brussels wake up,” he said, referring to the acceleration in accession talks since the start of Russia’s full-scale war against Ukraine.
‘No lectures from anyone on the fight against corruption’
One of the main challenges Albania has faced on its path to EU membership is the fight against corruption.
“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 to the fight against corruption,” Rama said.
Since presenting its EU candidacy, Albania has introduced several tools to combat corruption, including the establishment of a special anti-corruption body, SPAK, to address corruption and organised crime at the highest levels of government.
As part of this move, Rama’s government is using AI-powered technology. The move is embodied by an AI-generated avatar named ‘Diella’, who serves as a “virtual minister” tasked with improving public procurement and eliminating corruption.
“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,” he said.
Rama told Euronews that by 2027, the country will implement a fully AI-powered public procurement system designed to “deliver unprecedented levels of speed, transparency and accuracy”.