It smells of Russia here

European integrations of the West Balkan countries impede external forces. According to Reuters, such a statement was made by Albanian Prime Minister Eddie Ram at a press conference before meeting with the German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

"In our region, foreigners act in the region who will use any uncertainty to destroy our relations with the EU," the agency quotes the words of the frame.

The Albanian prime minister did not explain which foreigners he mean. Meanwhile, Reuters notes, recently the diplomats of the states of the region have expressed dissatisfaction with Russia's attempts to strengthen their influence in such countries of the Western Balkans as Serbia, Montenegro, Macedonia and Albania.

In October, a scandal broke out in connection with the proposed involvement of Russia to prepare a coup in Montenegro and the murder of the prime minister of this country Milo Dzhukanovich. The organizers of the crimes of the Chernogorsk Prosecutor's Office considered Russians Eduard Shirokov and Vladimir Popov. In the media there was information that Shirokov and Popov were GRU employees. It was also argued that among the persons detained in Serbia on suspicion of involvement in the preparation of the coup, there were Russian citizens. The Kremlin’s involvement in crimes was explained by an unplanned visit to Belgrade Secretary of the Russian Council of Ministers Nikolai Patrushev. It was also reported that the detained Russians flew along with Patrushev to Moscow. The Russian authorities refuted their involvement in the preparation of the coup in Montenegro.

Last week, it became known that the Montenegrin prosecutor’s office sentan appeal to Moscow about the interrogation of Shirokov and Popov by Russian investigators in the presence of Montenegrin colleagues.

In addition, at the end of October, the next day after the departure of Patrushev from Serbia, not far from the house in Belgrade, where Prime Minister Alexander Vuchich regularly found a cache with weapons , including a grenade launcher and manual grenades.

Since 2009, Albania has been a member of NATO, and since 2014 - a candidate for EU members. There is diplomatic relations between Tirana and Moscow, but the scale of political and economic cooperation of the two countries is insignificant. Albania joined the sanctions of the European Union against Russia. In turn, Moscow introduced the embargo to import Albanian food products.