Yearbook 2017
Albania. At the June parliamentary elections, the ruling Socialist Party and Prime Minister Edi Rama got their own majority. With 46% of the vote, the party got 74 out of the 140 seats in Parliament. The Democratic Party, which is the largest opposition party, received 29% of the vote and 43 seats. One thing is that both parties agree, they want membership in the EU. According to Countryaah.com, the turnout was very low, just over 45%; it was so low that the electoral commission decided to keep the polling stations open for another hour. In the last election in 2013, turnout was 53%.
In its annual report for 2016, the EU Commission recommends that the EU launch membership negotiations for Albania. At the same time, it points out that the country must implement political, economic and administrative reforms. Among other things, Albania must improve the fight against corruption and organized crime. Albania, a member of NATO since 2009, was granted EU candidate status in 2014.
In May, in Brussels and later in Stockholm, the six Western Balkan countries that are not yet EU members met: Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia. The aim of the meetings is to best coordinate their EU ambitions.
In August, the heat wave ravaged Lucifer on the Balkan Peninsula; In Albania alone, more than 300 firefighters worked to fight about seventy forest fires.