Albania

Slobodan Georgiev. Photo: Belgrade Media Centre.

The Balkan Investigative Reporting Network called on the Serbian police and prosecution on Thursday to take action after BIRN Serbia editor Slobodan Georgiev was vilified in an online video.

European Union High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini expects North Macedonia and Albania to start negotiations for accession to the European Union in June.

Photo: Wikimedia/Narih Lee

The latest report by Reporters Without Borders published on Thursday noted significant declines over the past year in levels of press freedom in Serbia, Albania and Moldova while the situation was improving in North Macedonia, Croatia and Kosovo.

Currently, a group of 108 women and children from Albania, Kosovo and North Macedonia want to return to the Balkans from the Al Hol camp. There are a small number of ethnic Albanian families in two other camps in Syria.

An Albanian biometric passport. Photo courtesy: Bevis Fusha / Safran

It comes after parliament in the Netherlands voted to deploy the so-called Emergency Break Mechanism for Albania due to concerns about rising criminal activity by Albanian nationals in the country.

"The move by the Dutch parliament is unprecedented, because as far as I know, previously has not been such a demand for the Western Balkans and our countries," he said.

Members of special police forces from North Macedonia, Albania and Kosovo took part in a joint exercise known as the 'Western Balkans flash,' in the Macedonian capital of Skopje on March 29. Photo: EPA/Georgi Licovski.

The central topic of Pisarri's book, which he developed out of his PhD thesis and which was originally published in Italian, is crimes against Serbian civilians in the part of the Kingdom of Serbia that was occupied by Bulgaria in 1915. The book will be issued in a Serbian translation this autumn.

The Kosovo parliament met on Thursday to hold a special session on the exodus of young people, which deputies warned was having a highly damaging effect on the country's economy and future. The MPs were due to vote a resolution on the subject that night.

The Adriatic city of Dubrovnik, Croatia's best-known tourist destination, on Thursday and Friday will host the 16 + 1 summit, a Chinese initiative to strengthen business ties between China and 16 countries from Central and Eastern Europe.