The US State Secretary, John Kerry, visited Tirana this Sunday, a very important visit for the Albanian politics in general.
It was the first time that Kerry had a concrete agenda for the internal politics of Albania. This was shown even in the meeting with the main political leaders. One of them was the opposition leader, Lulzim Basha, who met with Kerry this Sunday.
24 hours after this meeting, Lulzim Basha was invited in Top Channel’s political show “Top Story”, hosted by journalist Sokol Balla.
In this program, Basha spoke about the meeting with the US Secretary, about the National Bureau of Investigation, the Justice Reform and other current matters.
The opposition said that the visit of Kerry came in a time when Albania is facing a bad economic situation, with thousands applying for the US Lottery, other thousands immigrating to Europe. Basha valued the role of the USA to face challenges that are made against democracies in Europe, such as the model of Putin in Russia. He added that the Albanian people are today in front of the choice to accept the model of Edi Rama and Ilir Meta, or the model of the rule of law, which the USA supports.
Basha said that with Kerry he discussed about the decriminalization process, the only reform promoted by the opposition, and added that despite the fact that Kerry said that Albania is on the right track, Albania has not progressed with Rama on this track. Basha accused Rama of going against the decriminalization law, and of even supporting it.
When host Balla mentioned Xhelal Mziu, who was sentenced in prison but also ran for the party of Basha, the opposition leader said that Mziu’s case was different from that of eight candidates of the SP, because Mziu was elected before he was sentenced.
As for the National Bureau of Investigation, Basha denied any claims that Berisha had criticized him in the DP meeting for agreeing with the US on the draft law offered by the government. Basha said that these are lies, and that the last meeting with the US Ambassador was two days after receiving the recommendations of the Venice Commission. On January 28th, Basha said, he appealed the majority to pass the draft also for avoiding any claims that DP was being an obstacle.
When asked about the justice reform, if the DP will support any recommendation of the Venice Commission, Basha said there is no reason to doubt them, since they have never gone against European principles.
Top Channel
