site.btaVice President Yotova Meets Representatives of Bulgarian Community in Albania

Tirana, November 15 (BTA correspondent Assen Boyadzhiev) - Vice President Iliana Yotova said that Bulgarian institutions will do everything to ensure the rights of the Bulgarian minority in Albania. She was speaking at a meeting with representatives of the Bulgarian community in Albania at the Bulgarian Embassy in Tirana on Tuesday evening.

The Vice President who is on a working meeting in Albania, recounted her meetings with Albanian state leaders and MPs who contributed in the largest extent to the adoption of a law on protection of national minorities as well as with repesentatives of the Bulgarian societies in the regions of Korce, Golo Brdo and Gora.

Yotova said that she had received the assurances of the Albanian leaders that the rights enshrined in the law will be guaranteed and that the law allows the right of self identification of the Bulgarian national minority. In the next six months secondary legislation will be drafted that will allow the law to be implemented.

She underscored a right to air broadcasts in Bulgarian. Yotova and Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama discussed opening of cultural centres in Sofia and Tirana.

Yotova had told Albanian leaders that the Bulgarian minority in Bulgaria is a bridge to the development of relations between the two countries. The Bulgarian Vice President told her hosts that Bulgaria is speeding up the citizenship award procedure.

The adoption of the minorities act was historic success for all Bulgarians not only for those living in Albania, said Fisnik Hoxha, chair of the Nasha Gora society.

Ervis Taluri, deputy chair of the Bulgarian-Albanian Friendship Society, who is doing a postgraduate degree in Sofia's University of National and World Economy said that ties between Albania and Bulgaria should be strengthened in the area of education and economy.