Greece moved to obstruct Albania’s opening of EU accession talks, over Albania’s arrest of an ethnic Greek politician. Fredi Beleris is the Mayor of the Albanian southern city of Himara, which is majority Greek, and is facing a corruption charge which prevents him to assume the office.

In response, Greece announced that it is blocking the approval of financial assistance from the EU to Albania, that would come as the country hopes to open its EU accession talks. All the other EU member states approved these funds, but Greece can block them – just as it blocked Macedonia from opening EU accession talks for decades.

Albania is hoping to open the accession talks by the end of the year. It is in an informal group with Macedonia, which is blocked by Bulgaria. Due to recently renewed interest in enlargement in Brussels, which led to Ukraine and Moldova receiving their candidate status, Albania expected to be allowed to open talks even if Macedonia remains blocked by Bulgaria. But now the Greek move, over the arrest of Beleris, could endanger that. Greek paper Kathimerini declared that the move of the Greek Government is the first roadblock it puts before Albania, but that others may follow.