TIRANA, May 28 – Regional leaders gathered in Tirana this week as part of the Vienna Economic Forum discussing joint economic cooperation and infrastructure projects that will make the Balkans a more attractive market to foreign investors and prepare it for EU accession.
Erhard Busek, the President of the Vienna Economic Forum, said the forum which comes at the conclusion of Albania’s South-East European Cooperation Process presidency, was a good opportunity to increase investments and trade exchanges between regional countries.
“Things are moving forward in your region and I think this is a good message which must also be conveyed to the EU countries. I would dare to say that South Eastern Europe is the most stable part if we look at the crisis in some other countries around the world but also in Europe, and this has happened thanks to hard work by the governments of this region,” Busek said.
The Vienna Economic Forum was founded in 2004 with the aim of promoting the economic cooperation between the countries from the Adriatic to the Black Sea including Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Macedonia, Moldova, Montenegro, Slovenia, Turkey, Ukraine and Kosovo.
Speaking at the forum’s opening ceremony on Wednesday evening, Albania’s Prime Minister Edi Rama called for interaction to preserve peace and boost economic cooperation in the fragile region.
“Our economies are too fragile, and our budget strengths limited to handle the huge challenge of this peace with our own financial means,” said Rama.
“By interacting and creating bigger space for big companies and huge strategic investors, we give them the opportunity to invest not only in one country but in a much bigger market,” he added.
“Regional economies cannot walk on their own. Nobody is immune to the successes and failures of big economic powers. Our common goal is EU accession but we are aware this will not be an easy path,” Rama said on Thursday when five Prime Ministers from the region joined him on the second day of the forum.
“We are determined in our approach for a common market to coordinate projects with Western Balkans countries and have joint projects on the infrastructure interconnectivity,” he added.
Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic, who made a historic visit to Albania, the first by a Serbian Prime Minister, emphasized the need for concrete infrastructure cooperation projects with or without EU assistance.
“We have a market of 20 million consumers and we should be more confident in ourselves. I have proposed to Prime Minister Rama to sign some joint projects and introduce them to the EU. If we don’t get this support, we will start with our own money although it will be difficult,” said Vicic.
“Serbia is open to all integration programmes in the Western Balkans and encourages stability,” he added.
Kosovo Prime Minister Isa Mustafa, who also exchanged a friendly handshake with his Serbian counterpart, appealed for cooperation and turning old conflicts in the region into cooperation bridges.
“We are in a stage when we are turning our disagreements into cooperation bridges to find ourselves into the EU,” said Mustafa.
The Prime Ministers of Macedonia, Montenegro and Bosnia and Herzegovina also stressed the needed for increased cooperation and interconnectivity between the regional countries.
The Nis-Prishtina-Tirana highway, the Belgrade-Bar-Durres-Vlore railway line, the construction of Corridor 11 from Belgrade to Montenegro and its intersection with the Adriatic-Ionian Motorway i.e. the Blue Corridor, reconstruction of the Belgrade-Bar rail line and its connection with Albanian harbors are some of the joint projects Albania and Serbia have proposed.
The Vienna Economic Forum in Tirana named “From Berlin to Vienna: Bringing back geopolitical certainty to the Western Balkans” came after a conference on Western Balkans held in August 2014 in Berlin, where German Chancellor Angela Merkel reconfirmed the Western Balkans future into the European Union.
