Albania's president says an independent Kosovo would contribute to peace in region

ATHENS, Greece: Albania's president said Monday that an independent Kosovo would contribute to peace and stability in the Balkans and Europe.

During a visit to neighboring Greece, President Bamir Topi said he had discussed Balkan issues, including the status of Kosovo, with President Karolos Papoulias.

Topi said afterward that granting Kosovo independence "would be a valuable contribution toward the final peace in the region."

Kosovo has been administered by the United Nations since a NATO-led bombardment in 1999 halted a Serb crackdown in the southern province, which is 90 percent ethnic Albanian.

On Monday in Austria, international envoys were making a final effort to get Kosovo and Belgarde to agree on the province's future status.

Topi said the future of the western Balkans lies firmly in Europe.

"I believe, and I am convinced, that the region of Kosovo and Albania, but also Serbia, see their future in the European family," Topi said.

The two presidents, who have little real power, strove to patch up relations strained two years ago when Papoulias cut short a visit to Albania after protesters gathered outside his hotel.

Relations between Greece and Albania have been strained periodically since the 1990 fall of communism in the tiny Balkan country because of perceptions of racism and xenophobia in Greece, and over the status and treatment of hundreds of thousands of Albanian immigrants.

On Monday Papoulias, who was Greece's foreign minister in the late 1980s and mid-1990s reiterated Greece's support for the "European and Euro-Atlantic perspective of Albania," which aims to join NATO and the EU.

Up to 1 million Albanians live in Greece, many of them without proper immigration status, while Greece is the biggest single investor in Albania. (IHT, Koha Shqiptare)