Prime Ministers of Albania

Albanian police have continued combing the village of Lazarat, conducting house-to-house searches to find members of the armed group that on Wednesday killed 31-year-old special forces officer Ibrahim Basha in an ambush.

Since the operation started on Wednesday, police have detained dozens of suspects, mostly young man, for questioning by prosecutors.

The left-wing coalition headed by Prime Minister Edi Rama won or is leading in key races in the local elections held on Sunday in Albania, but its victory is expected to be much less convincing than in 2013.

The US government has praised Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic and his Albanian counterpart Edi Rama for trying to move on from the conflicts of the past toward a new era of friendship and cooperation in the Balkans.

Misa Djurkovic of the Institute for European Studies has told B92 that Albania is "not well-intenetioned" toward Serbia.

Albanian PM Edi Rama on Wednesday fielded a question on relations with Greece and the recently emerged issue that Tirana tabled regarding the delineation of maritime borders in the Ionian Sea.
Rama answered the press question as he appeared with his Serbian counterpart Aleksandar Vucic at a press conference. Vucic is on a closely watched on a two-day visit to Tirana.

Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic met with Albanian Parliament Speaker Ilir Meta in Tirana Wednesday to discuss relations between the two countries.

They also spoke about "ways to improve economic cooperation, including establishing direct flights between Belgrade and Tirana," Tanjug reported.

On a historic trip to Albania by the Serbian Prime Minister on Wednesday, the two sides underlined the importance of regional cooperation and agreed to disagree on the independence of the former Serbian province of Kosovo.

Vucic arrived in Tirana on Wednesday morning and was welcomed at the airport by Deputy Prime Minister Niko Peleshi.

Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic has said that the differences between Serbia and Albania have to do with "the stance on Kosovo."

He made the comment after his meeting in Tirana with Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama.

The main political parties in Albania officially started electoral campaigns on Saturday for the next local elections, but the first days of the campaign were marred by claims of irregularities.

On Saturday, Zef Hila, the opposition Democratic Party candidate for the municipality of Vau i Dejes, alleged that he was subjected to harassment by police officers.

Parties in Albania condemned a man who threw a chair amid a crowd attending a Democratic Party rally in Kolonja, in southeast Albania on Wednesday, injuring a 63-year-old.

The chairman of the Democratic Party and current Mayor of Tirana, Lulzim Basha, was also at the rally where the local candidate for mayor was being presented.