Rama’s Foreign Policy: Surrender by Design

Albania no longer shields Kosovo, it shadows Serbia. Zhulali warns: Rama's foreign policy isn't strategy; it's surrender masked as diplomacy. The region can't afford his silence.

In the days following the May elections¹, Ilda Zhulali, the poised yet forthright foreign policy expert for the Democratic Party, received me on a modest hotel terrace in Tirana. A former diplomat by training, she had grown increasingly vocal in her criticisms of Prime Minister Rama’s approach to Kosovo. As we sat together, what followed was a disarmingly frank interview. Zhulali did not hedge. Her tone was neither performative nor rhetorical. She spoke with clarity, conviction, and what appeared to be a deep sense of urgency.

Ilda Zhulali, foreign policy adviser to Albania’s Democratic Party, speaks with The Gunpowder Chronicles in Tirana, May 13, 2025. Her message: Albania must reclaim its role as Kosovo’s unwavering ally.

“Our relationship with Kosovo,” she began, “has always been one of brotherhood. We have never looked at it in the way Rama does, as some abstract, strategic partnership. That language creates distance. For us, Kosovo is not a junior partner or an extension of our dip…