BIRN: Government is hiding Rama-Melon agreement for refugees

Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama and Italy's chief minister, Giorgia Melon, announced at a joint press conference Monday that thousands of refugees who land on the Italian coast would be accommodated in Albania, pending treatment of their asylum application.

The two prime ministers posted before the cameras signing an agreement, which, although causing an avalanche of reactions in Albania, continues to remain unknown to public opinion.

The “is meant for a waiting centre and for a post to proceed with all verifications, with all records,” said Rama in a brief interview for journalist Bruno Vespa, according to the government's announcement, but the contents of the document were not made public either during Tuesday.

BIRN requested a copy of the signed agreement, but the directed director of the Agency for Media and Information, Alteo Hysi, said it would take time to provide an answer to the request for information rights. He did not answer the question that “why the agreement was not made public”.

This agency was content with a post on the social Facebook network entitled “certain facts on the last deal...”, under which “in Albania will not reach more than 3 thousand immigrants at the same time”.

Facebook status also stresses that Italy will take over Albanian territory for the establishment of host facilities, that expenses for this process would be covered by Italy, and that the maximum term of an immigrant's stay in Albania cannot be greater than the time needed for asylum procedures.

Prime Minister Rama's personal decision and lack of transparency for the deal was criticised by the opposition.

The Democratic Party announced that it had requested urgent interference with Rama on the issue at the plenary session and accused the government of lack of transparency.

“In this request, The DP wants the Albanian government to provide clarifications concerning this agreement, as there is no transparency from the Albanian side, while the Italian side has echoed this pact with our government,”, reported in the DP's announcement.

While the other opposition democratic group, led by former Prime Minister Sali Berisha, called the agreement invalid and accused Rama of serving human trafficking with this agreement.

“Albania has the highest trafficking potential in Europe, and Edi Rama wants to feed his co-operatents and other gangs with multiple challenges,” said Berisha in a public response.

Meanwhile, he suggested that there is an agreement in force between the two countries, signed during the time when he was prime minister, which guarantees that any immigrant passing from Albania to Italy, of other countries, will return to Albania to start at home.

According to Berisha, in terms of 100 thousand Albanians leaving the country from 2014 to 2021, HINA “Rama has no moral and no legal authority... to sign in the name of Albania”.

An agreement between the two countries cannot only go into effect with the prime minister's firm, but requires approval in the Council of Ministers and ratification in parliament. / BIRN/laps.al