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Abuses of IPARD funds, Marta Kos: Albania must change its political culture

2025-11-18 20:53:23Aktualitet SHKRUAR NGA REDAKSIA VOX
Marta Kos

Enlargement Commissioner Marta Kos, in an interview with DeutscheWelle from Brussels, was asked about high-level corruption in Albania, one of the key problems on the path to EU membership, focusing, among other things, on the abuse of IPARD II agricultural funds.

Asked whether Albania will be able to manage these funds in the future, Kos replied that yes, but stressed that we must be careful.

“Yes, I am sure, but we have to be careful. There are many reasons, because it is EU taxpayers' money and I am responsible for it. Some cases in Albania have shown that SPAK is working. If we see that cases are being detected, it shows that we have also done a good job in the accession process ,” she said.

The Commissioner underlined that the fight against corruption is part of the European Union's main priorities for candidate countries and that Albania needs to make more reforms.

"And the fight against corruption is in the group of so-called "Fundamentals", which means that this is really the area where we make a lot of efforts to help candidate countries. On the other hand, they have to make a lot of reforms. In Albania, the verification of judges has been carried out. It is not really easy, SPAK is giving results ," Kos told DW.

Question: The group-chapter that opened yesterday also deals with agriculture, among other things. And when agriculture was mentioned, you said that Albania should be very careful in managing the funds. We have a bad experience from the past, with IPARD funds. Currently, IPARD III funds are frozen. And unfortunately, Albania is a country with a high level of corruption. Do you think that Albania will be able to manage these funds in the future?

Marta Kos : Yes, I'm sure, but we have to be careful. There are many reasons, because it's EU taxpayers' money and I'm responsible for it. Some cases in Albania have shown that SPAK is working. If we see that cases have been discovered, it shows that we have also done a good job in the accession process. And the fight against corruption is in the group of so-called "Fundamentals", which means that this is really the area where we make a lot of efforts to help candidate countries.

On the other hand, they need to do a lot of reforms. In Albania, the verification of judges has been carried out. It is not really easy, SPAK is delivering results. But, this is not enough. It is about changing the political culture. A country can have the best possible laws against corruption, but if corruption is accepted by the people then we have not done enough. So, this is the main point of action.


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