Why Albania’s Kosovo Policy Is a Crisis

As Serbia rattles sabres, Albania’s silence screams. Under Rama, Tirana has drifted from Kosovo’s ally to Serbia’s enabler. The betrayal is calculated, and complete.

In the gentle hills of Albania, as the spring of 2025 gave way to the heat of political tension, a silence hung heavy over Tirana’s political elite. The country, poised on the edge of yet another parliamentary election, was teeming with slogans and stagecraft. Yet, amid the patriotic fervour, one subject remained stubbornly unspoken: Kosovo.

I had entered Albania on the 1st of May, just days after covering the funeral of Pope Francis in Rome. My intention was clear: to report on the parliamentary elections, yes, but more urgently, to investigate the foreign policy direction of Prime Minister Edi Rama’s administration, particularly its impact on Kosovo’s national security in light of Serbia’s continued aggression¹.

The story, it turned out, was not in the spectacle of campaign rallies, many of which I attended, unannounced², to gauge the political pulse, but in the chasm of silence from the Socialist Party leadership, who consistently evaded comment on their record in dealing with Pristina…