As part of his agenda in Budapest, where he is participating in the Fifth Meeting of the European Political Community, Prime Minister Edi Rama held a meeting with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, followed by a joint press conference:

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Prime Minister Edi Rama:

Pope Francis said that Hungarian is the language of heaven because you need an eternity to learn it. I must say that Albanian is the language of purgatorium because you need an eternity to know if you deserve hell or paradise when you translate it. So I prefer my broken English than to rely on a translator especially because I have to start thanking him, the black sheep of Europe. So, you better listen directly to me, as I don’t want the translator to be blamed for me afterward.

It has truly been a very special day, and not just because this is such a beautiful capital city where we’ve had the chance to enjoy meaningful discussions with the Hungarian Prime Minister. Let me say it all: it has been especially unique to witness all of Europe gathering in this land of Viktor’s “black sheep.” So, thank you Viktor! It will be a huge privilege to work as a team to ensure that the next ECP meeting in Tirana is just as successful as this one.

I must tell you that, until not too many years ago, such dialogue with the EU was unimaginable. There are several reasons one can count for that, and naturally, Vladimir Putin is one of them because he gave the European Union a wake-up call. However, I must say that this forum, together with what is happening with the European Commission and the New Growth Plan through gradual integration, is very encouraging.

As Viktor emphasized in his remarks, and as everyone would agree, this forum has a special energy and a speacial virtue: unlike other forums where everyone shares their opinions and that’s the end of it, here there is a much freer exchange of opinions. As Viktor also mentioned, there is a very sensible sense of freedom to even approach the dangerous subjects.

I won’t take up too much more of your time because I know most of you are here to ask him about the landlord of the White House. But I just want to say that we believe, and we jointly thanked Emmanuel Macron, the President of France, His Majesty, because we believe that his idea to push the organization of such a format—a longstanding French vision dating back to the 17th and 18th centuries in the famous perpetual peace by Abbot Saint-Pierre and later efforts by a series of other French presidents who were not really happy for the enlargement—is something truly destined to be useful. Not only that, but it’s clear that we need to work together as a team to propose a new structure, hopefully a permanent structure for strategic thinking, like a kind of secretariat behind the forum, to strengthen the link between the two forums. Which is great, but structuring it better would be even greater.

As the French President, His Majesty, underlined today: “If we count the people represented in this wonderful space of this fantastic new stadium, it is the Europe of 700 million.” It is extraordinary.

Of course, within this Europe of 700 million, there are different ways of thinking, different perspectives, but the number itself makes you think about how many things need to be different and how many things we can do for the good of all European flags, if these 700 million people are represented more substantively by these people.

These are roughly my thoughts. I remain tragically optimistic about the future—about the future of Albania, a country whose place is undoubtedly in Europe. We will fight every day, and now a new path has opened up for us, thanks to the Hungarian presidency, which has pushed things forward strongly. We are now in membership negotiations and hope to be ready to join within this decade, alongside the other Western Balkan countries.

We hope this happens because it is becoming less and less acceptable to maintain two borders in the European Union—one inside and one outside. We need to eliminate the need to cross one border to enter the Western Balkans, a space that should be fully unified to safeguard ourselves and others from external interferences. At the same time, we need to put an end to this experiment of having a “bordered stomach’” that doesn’t function properly within the body of the EU.

Thank you very much!