VZCZCXRO6089
OO RUEHDBU RUEHFL RUEHKW RUEHLA RUEHROV RUEHSR
DE RUEHTI #0989/01 3181605
ZNY CCCCC ZZH
O 141605Z NOV 07
FM AMEMBASSY TIRANA
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC IMMEDIATE 6402
INFO RUEHZL/EUROPEAN POLITICAL COLLECTIVE PRIORITY
RUEKJCS/SECDEF WASHINGTON DC PRIORITY
RHCHAAA/NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL WASHINGTON DC PRIORITY
RUEKJCS/JOINT STAFF WASHINGTON DC PRIORITY

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 TIRANA 000989 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SIPDIS 
 
BELGRADE ALSO FOR PODGORICA 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/09/2017 
TAGS: PREL MARR PGOV NATO AL
SUBJECT: ALBANIA:  READOUT OF NOVEMBER 7 INTERAGENCY 
EVALUATION VISIT 
 
REF: A) TIRANA 967 B) TIRANA 974 C) TIRANA 463 D) 
     TIRANA 885 
 
Classified By: Ambassador John L. Withers II, Reasons 1.4 (B) and (D). 
 
Summary 
------- 
 
¶1. (C) The Interagency Team led by USNATO Ambassador Nuland 
on November 7 provided clear benchmarks toward NATO 
integration to Albania's President Topi, Prime Minister 
Berisha and key Ministers, and a group of Parliamentarians. 
She explained that the USG and other NATO Allies will start 
making national decisions after the Membership Action Plan 
(MAP) cycle ends in February 2008 whether or not to invite 
Albania, Croatia, and Macedonia to join NATO, with an 
Alliance decision at the Bucharest Summit in April.  She 
stressed three areas in which the GOA needs to show concrete 
progress in the next three months in order to be in the best 
position for an invitation: 
 
-- judicial reform - implement existing legislation and draft 
new laws to strengthen judiciary independence and the rule of 
law; a key indicator will be the GOA's appointment of an 
effective, independent, highly-qualified jurist to replace 
recently-ousted Prosecutor General Theodor Sollaku; 
-- electoral reform - make progress toward establishing a 
functioning civil registry and developing an ID card system; 
and 
-- trafficking - continue fighting all kinds of trafficking 
and ensure that returning victims of human trafficking 
receive necessary help. 
 
Nuland stressed that Albania must sustain progress in 
military reforms, economic growth, and good neighborly 
relations and advised her interlocutors that Albania's help 
is needed to keep peace in the region, particularly with 
respect to Kosovo and ethnic tensions in Macedonia.  Senior 
Albanians must continue their full court press in more 
skeptical European capitals as well. 
 
¶2. (C) President Topi, Prime Minister Berisha, and Foreign 
Minister Basha highlighted Albania's progress in implementing 
MAP reforms and cited statistics showing results in law 
enforcement, corruption and economic indicators. 
Acknowledging that corruption was still a serious problem, 
the GOA representatives were optimistic that a new Prosecutor 
General would help the GOA fulfill its campaign promise to 
reduce corruption significantly.  End Summary. 
 
The Last Coaching Session 
------------------------- 
 
¶3. (U) USNATO Ambassador Victoria Nuland led an Interagency 
team including D/AS for Defense Daniel Fata, NSC NATO 
Director Toby Bradley, EUR/SCE Director Christopher Hoh, JCS 
J5 Col. Mark Shields, USNATO Enlargement Officer Thomas 
Underwood, and Enlargement Officer Matthew Thompson to meet 
with GOA officials on November 7 to assess Albania's progress 
on MAP reforms. 
 
¶4. (C) Ambassador Nuland drove home a similar message 
throughout the day:  Albania must continue to work hard on 
judicial and electoral reforms and on reducing trafficking. 
She underscored that Albania must make concrete, demonstrable 
progress in these areas by February.  Nuland stressed that 
some Allies are not as supportive of Albania's invitation as 
the GOA may think and that GOA officials must step up 
marketing efforts to make sure skeptical Allies understand 
how much progress Albania has made.  Ambassador Nuland also 
advised the PM that if Albania is invited to join NATO, it 
will have to show that it can protect NATO's classified 
material and must devote resources to this effort. 
 
Basha Leads Off 
--------------- 
 
¶5. (C) FM Basha told the team that electoral and judicial 
reforms are the two main pillars of Albania's MAP, and was 
confident the process would move forward.  (See also Ref B.) 
He considered Albania's biggest problem to be its lack of 
professional capacity at all levels, something which will 
take time to remedy.  On electoral reform, Basha cited 
progress on the technical front:  a new civil registry system 
recently launched with the help of Austria and the OSCE, and 
the imminent tender for biometric ID cards and passports. 
The new documents should be ready by next summer.  However, 
 
TIRANA 00000989  002.2 OF 003 
 
 
he said that legislative issues, such as districting and 
proportional representation, are much more complicated, given 
Albania's culture and history, and would not be completed 
before next summer. 
 
The PM Lists the GOA's Achievements 
----------------------------------- 
 
¶6. (C) PM Berisha assembled key ministers (Basha - MFA, Mediu 
- Defense, Rusmajli - Justice, Bregu - Integration, Bode - 
Finance, Ruli - Economy, and Nishani - Interior), but was the 
group's sole speaker.  After a long recitation of Albania's 
recent reform successes, he received Nuland's list of 
incomplete homework in a constructive spirit, and pledged to 
do the hard work necessary to have a good story to tell NATO 
at his mid-January MAP presentation.  He admitted that 
organized crime was still a big problem, but cited Italian 
statistics showing trafficking to Italy was declining.  He 
attributed this to better border controls, implementation of 
the new Albanian State Police Law, and an organized crime 
task force consisting of prosecutors, criminal police, and 
tax inspectors (the Joint Investigativ Unit, Ref C). 
 
¶7. (C) Berisha's list of successes included the fight against 
corruption, which he expected to accelerate next year with a 
new Prosecutor General.  He was adamant about passing 
legislation to remove immunity, saying that no one should be 
above the law.  He was also proud of his government's 
economic achievements, citing an improved business climate 
from the recently implemented business registration centers 
("one stop shop"), a ten percent flat tax, reduced social 
contributions, and the GOA's "one euro" initiative.  He 
claimed that these programs, plus the fact that Albania has 
the lowest production costs of any European country, have 
greatly increased the flow of investment into Albania.  He 
pointed also to the e-government initiatives under the MCA 
Threshold Project, which he said have saved the country money 
by increasing efficiency while reducing opportunities for 
bureaucratic corruption.  To maintain that momentum for the 
future, he is doubling the education budget, plans to have 
internet in every school by the end of 2008, and has been 
talking to Cisco and Microsoft to open technical academies in 
Albania.  Berisha told the team that the government 
understands how important property rights are and is working 
on a land cadastre which will marry citizens' property 
registrations with a new aerial map by the end of July.  On 
foreign policy, he urged the delegation to take a measured 
approach in encouraging Macedonia to move forward with 
reforms and to better its relations with Greece.  He 
criticized the EU's recent SAA report on Macedonia as being 
too harsh. 
 
President Topi 
-------------- 
 
¶8. (C) Ambassador Nuland told Topi that he has an opportunity 
to show he is "the President for all Albanians" by selecting 
a Prosecutor General with a clean, professional reputation 
able to receive broad support.   She stressed the importance 
of marketing Albania until it has a positive reputation 
around kitchen tables in Allied countries.  The President 
told the team that the U.S. is the greatest friend Albania 
has.  He was pleased with Albania's accomplishments on its 
MAP but acknowledged that it has more to do.  Many of his 
comments were focused on regional issues with Kosovo and 
Macedonia, about whose relations with Greece and its 
treatment of the Albania minority he voiced concerns. 
 
Parliamentarians 
---------------- 
 
¶9. (C) The team met with the Co-Chairs of Parliament's Ad-hoc 
NATO Committee, the Chair and Deputy Chair of the Security 
Committee, and the two deputy Speakers.  (Each pair 
represents one opposition and one majority MP.)  While 
acknowledging disagreements among them, the MPs said that 
Parliament is committed to ensuring the stability of the 
democratic process in Albania and focuses on keeping in step 
with European positions.  They cited recent legislation 
increasing sentences for terrorism-related activities and 
gender/ethnic crimes.  Ambassador Nuland told them they need 
to continue working on deepening and strengthening the 
judicial reform process and to promote legislation stressing 
fairness and transparency.  She said the Allies are looking 
at the political maturity of the MPs as well as the strength 
and irreversibility of reforms.  Following the team's 
departure, parliamentarians of both sides referred publicly 
 
TIRANA 00000989  003 OF 003 
 
 
to the need for cooperative efforts on NATO-related reforms. 
 
Exporting Security 
------------------ 
 
¶10. (C) Ambassador Nuland stressed to all interlocutors the 
importance of Albania being a good neighbor and counselor to 
Kosovo and Macedonia.  The PM described Albania as a country 
of religious tolerance that had never had problems with 
religious differences or ethnicity, making it a good 
candidate to calm such tensions in the region.  President 
Topi, voicing concern about Macedonia, mentioned that he had 
recently met with President Crvenkovski and cautioned him 
about possible fallout from slow implementation of the Ohrid 
Framework Agreement.  He also met with the leaders of 
Macedonia's two ethnic Albanian parties, urging dialogue to 
defuse the tension which has lasted between them for almost 
two years.  Topi will continue to work with the leaders to 
try to calm tensions after the previous day's police 
operation in Tetovo.  The Parliamentarians as well echoed the 
need to remain engaged with ethnic Albanians in the region 
and mentioned several Parliamentary meetings and outreach 
efforts which included the Kosovars. 
 
¶11. (C) In a separate meeting, DefMin Mediu told Fata and 
Shields that he is working with the opposition to reach 
consensus on sending an additional company to Iraq, as 
promised to the U.S. (Ref D).  Mediu had spoken of the issue 
to a mixed group of parliamentarians the previous day and 
received initial support. 
 
¶12. (U) Ambassador Nuland's press conference was widely 
covered by the broadcast and print media.  She thanked 
Albania for its troop contributions, saying that Albania had 
changed from a security importer to a global security 
exporter.  The media focused on her comment that Albania was 
not ready at this moment to join NATO.  Reactions from across 
the politically-polarized media spectrum ranged from 
criticism that the GOA was not doing enough to optimism on 
how far the GOA had progressed. 
 
Comment 
------- 
 
¶13. (C) Ambassador Nuland and the interagency team clearly 
left their GOA interlocutors fired up and cautiously 
optimistic.  A year after the shock of their substandard MAP 
submission in Brussels, the message they took from the visit 
is that Albania is again on the right track, and can attain 
the goal of an invitation to NATO with sustained effort in a 
few key areas.  In sum, Nuland's message struck home: 
Albania has hard work to do, and little time in which to do 
it, if its NATO goal is to be reached. 
 
¶14. (U) Ambassador Nuland has cleared this cable. 
WITHERS