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The ratification of the agreement with Italy for immigrants has echoed in the foreign media.
The prestigious American newspaper "Washington Post" said that the controversial 5-year agreement only serves the policies of Giorgia Meloni.
According to the newspaper, this agreement, opposed by many parties, will be implemented in a country like Albania, which is not an EU country.
Full article:
The Parliament of Albania approves the controversial agreement for keeping immigrants to Italy
Albania's parliament approved a deal for the country to detain thousands of asylum seekers for Italy in a vote on Thursday, despite protests from opposition lawmakers and human rights groups.
Under the five-year agreement, Albania would host up to 3,000 migrants rescued from international waters at any one time. With asylum applications expected to take about a month to process, the number of asylum seekers sent to Albania could reach up to 36,000 a year.
Albania is not an EU country and the idea of sending asylum seekers outside the bloc is controversial. The deal was approved by European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen, but has been widely criticized by human rights groups.
The agreement, signed in November between Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, is part of Meloni's efforts to share the burden of handling migration with other European countries.
Parliament, dominated by Rama's left-wing Socialist Party, voted 77-0 to approve the deal in a brief 15-minute vote, as opposition lawmakers stalled the vote and tried to derail it with whistles.
Rama was not present at the vote, but said afterwards that it showed that Albania was standing with Italy and acting as an EU state, "agreeing to share a burden that Europe must bear united as a whole family in the face of a bold challenge that transcends the traditional left-right divide."
Albania's conservative opposition has regularly tried to split parliament since October to protest the Socialists' refusal to create parliamentary commissions to investigate suspected cases of cabinet corruption.
A group of 30 opposition lawmakers earlier went to the Constitutional Court in an unsuccessful attempt to block the deal on human rights grounds, but opposition leader Gazment Bardhi did not comment on it ahead of the vote.
The small party Justice, Integration, Unity supported the agreement with its three votes.
Italy's lower house of parliament approved the deal in January, followed by the Senate earlier this month.
Two processing centers will be set up in Albania at a cost to Italy of more than 600 million euros (about 650 million dollars) over five years. The facilities will be fully run by Italy while it expedites their asylum applications. Meloni has said that he expects them to become operational by the spring of 2024.
Italy will remain legally responsible for the migrants throughout the process and will welcome them if they are granted international protection or arrange their deportation from Albania if refused.
Those caught within Italian territorial waters, or by rescue vessels operated by non-governmental organisations, would retain their right under international and EU law to apply for asylum in Italy and have their claims processed. their there.
Rama has said that Albania stands by Meloni as a sign of gratitude on behalf of the Albanians who found refuge in Italy and "escaped hell and imagined a better life" after the fall of communism in Albania in the 1990s.
Italy has asked for help from other EU countries to deal with the growing number of arrivals. Data from Italy's Interior Ministry showed that immigrant arrivals in Italy increased by 50% in 2023 from the previous year. Some 155,750 migrants reached Italian shores last year, including more than 17,000 unaccompanied minors, compared to 103,850 in 2022.
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