Ditmir Bushati

Prime Minister Edi Rama on Friday axed seven of his 14 ministers after a year of popular protests against government policies.

Rama summoned the National Assembly of his governing Socialist Party in Tirana and insisted that the changes were "not the result of failures".

Albanian Foreign Minister Ditmir Bushati said in a meeting in Tirana with representatives of the Albanian community in Serbia that his country will demand that Serbia respects their rights.

Head of the Romanian diplomacy Teodor Melescanu will participate on Monday in the meeting of the Foreign Affairs Council (CAE) to be held in Luxembourg, where the EU member states' Foreign ministers will have a joint working session with the Ministers of Defence, on which occasion they will assess the stage of progress in security and defence.

Officials in Albania have hailed the agreement between bordering Greece and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia to end their decades-long name dispute as good for the whole Western Balkans region.

A group photo taken during the Visegrad-4 Plus Balkan-4 Plus meeting of the foreign ministers of eight Central European and Balkan EU countries at Cape Sounio, south of Athens, Friday. Pictured from left to right are Poland's Jacek Czaputowicz, Albania's Ditmir Bushati, Nikos Kotzias of Greece, Bulgaria's Ekaterina Zaharieva, Slovakia's Ivan Korcok and Marija Pejcinovic Buric of Croatia.

Greece's Foreign Minister Nikos Kotzias (center), his Bulgarian counterpart Ekaterina Zaharieva (2nd from l), Nikola Dimitrov of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (r), and Albania's Ditmir Bushati (l) are pictured in Thessaloniki Friday. The ministers discussed cross-border cooperation and security challenges in the region.

Albania expelled two Russian diplomats on Monday, as the EU aspirant country joined the UK, the EU, the US and Canada in a coordinated response to the nerve agent poisoning of  Sergei Skripal, a former Russian intelligence official, and his daughter, Yulia, in Salisbury England.

Croatian Foreign Minister Marija Pejcinovic Buric signed an agreement with a UN representative in Albania Brian Williams to help a project to fight marine pollution, in the presence of Albanian Foreign Minister Ditmir Bushati and Minister of Tourism, Blendi Klosi.

BELGRADE - Serbian FM Ivica Dacic announced on Tuesday Serbia, Italy and Albania would organise trilateral meetings of their chambers of commerce and NGOs in order to boost relations.

Albania President Ilir Meta on Friday met parliament's foreign affairs committee, seeking more talks on the government's request for authorization to negotiate a new maritime border deal with Greece.