Albania received another “best ever report” this week from the European Commission which, according to PM Edi Rama, is the most trusted international report because is based on facts, rather than surveys and perceptions. Indeed, Brussels brought many good news for Albania this Autumn. After the second IGC which practically opened the Fundamentals’ Cluster, EU responded to the country’s ambition to be ready for EU membership by 2030 with a very concrete offer – the possibility to open all negotiating clusters by the end of 2025. “It's ambitious, but it's possible. But it means that really all the resources, energies and attention has to be focused on that goal.” – declared the EU Ambassador in Tirana Silvio Gonzato. But such ambition and offer mean that there can be no further hesitations to meet EU standards. “There can be no beating about the bush and saying we need more time to adjust or to take on certain standards” Ambassador Gonzato emphasized.

For the first time is several years, the EC report was met with high interest by Albanian media and stakeholders which comes as a result of these developments in Albania’s EU bid. Having started the negotiations on Cluster 1, many were eager to learn what awaits and how far the is country from the end goal – entering the EU “club”. Compared to a year before, the EC 2024 report points out at some good news and also at some not so good ones. Over the last 12 months Albania noted “no progress” in two more chapters compared to a year before – Right of Establishment (Ch 3), Company Law (Ch6) and Chapter 12. Less progress was made this year also in many of the areas of the Fundamentals while in some of them the government made “no progress” at all, such as civil society and freedom of expression.

Particularly concerning is the fact that EU’s negotiation position on Cluster 1 with Albania sets no interim benchmark for the country to meet on civil society development except for few “tasks” such as consulting the sector and keeping an active dialogue with it. This is not good news for civil society and the shrinking civic space considering that for several years now Albania made “no progress” in this area according to the EC country report. Even more alarming is the lack of progress in the freedom of expression area where “media independence and pluralism continued to be affected by the high market concentration, the overlap of business and political interests, the lack of transparency of financing sources, the high concentration of media ownership, intimidation and precarious working conditions for journalists” (EC Report 2024). This area of the Fundamentals has shown persistently “no progress” in almost all EC reports for Albania 2020-2024 and has clearly conditioned the country’s decline of democracy according to several reports, such as Freedom House’s ‘Nations in Transit’.

Yet, this year’s EC report notes good news too. Namely, Albania has achieved “moderate to good level of preparedness” in two more chapters while the number of chapters with “some to moderate level of preparedness” decreased from four in 2023 to only two chapters this year. While opening of Cluster 6 is likely to happen soon, the opening of the remaining ones will be subject to significant progress in meeting the interim benchmarks set in EU’s common position.

Meaningful progress will require not only determination and stronger political will, but also constructive cooperation between ruling and opposition parties. Yet, this seems to be difficult to achieve in an electoral year with general elections set to take place around Spring 2025. In fact, the confrontational political rhetoric between the majority and opposition parties has already started and will likely intensify in the next six months.

Election years in Albania usually slow down progress and public administration mobilization around reforming processes. However, this is no time to “beat around the bush” as Ambassador Gonzato warns. Albania needs to channel all possible resources and energies within this process. Under the assumption that EU member states are ready to take bold political actions in pushing forward with enlargement, Albania has a window of opportunity to deliver on the benchmarks that would trigger the opening of all clusters by the end of 2025.That is entirely possible considering the fact that the majority of them require a track record of results in implementing reforms and meeting targets, rather than political consensus in designing new ones.