The Western Balkans are an integral part of the European Union and Spain fully backs the region's integration into the 27-member bloc, Spain's prime minister said on Monday. Pedro Sanchez was in Albania's capital Tirana on Monday in the first-ever trip by a Spanish prime minister to the country.
The stop in Albania was the last leg of Sanchez's Western Balkan trip that earlier took him to Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro and North Macedonia. “The EU cannot be conceived without the Balkans,” Sanchez said at the news conference with Albanian counterpart Edi Rama. “Balkans' incorporation will strengthen and add EU members.”
The 27-member bloc agreed to launch the accession talks with Albania and North Macedonia late last month, a long-delayed step in the Balkan nations' paths toward EU membership that gained momentum amid the war in Ukraine. Western Balkan countries are at different stages of EU integration. Serbia and Montenegro already have started the talks while Bosnia and Kosovo have only signed the Stabilisation and Association Agreement, the first step in the long process.
