BRUSSELS (AFP) - European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana called on Albania yesterday to step up the fight against corruption, vowing to maintain pressure on Tirana despite signing a key accord with the Balkan state. The EU agreed last month to sign a Stabilization and Association Agreement (SAA) with the poor Southeastern European country, seen as a key step on the path toward possible eventual EU membership. But Solana, speaking after talks with Albanian Foreign Minister Besnik Mustafaj, said Tirana cannot let its guard down. The EU official “exhorted Albania to push ahead with the EU-reform agenda and to remain focussed on fighting corruption and organized crime,” his office said in a statement. “The conclusion of negotiations for the stabilization and association agreement (does) not mean that the work has finished. On the contrary, it (has) only started and even more (will) be expected by Albania in terms of reform reform implementation,” he added.

SOFIA (Reuters) - A powerful bomb exploded in front of the apartment of a Bulgarian television reporter early yesterday, smashing windows and walls in a seven-story building but causing no casualties, police said. The attack came as Bulgaria is trying to prove to the European Union that it can crack down on rampant high-level corruption and organized crime, as the EU will decide on May 16 whether to let the Balkan state join in 2007 or delay its entry by a year. Journalist Vasil Ivanov said he believed the bomb was intended to kill him following a string of investigative stories in which he uncovered a number of acts of fraud, inmate abuse at prisons, and other crimes. “My family was inside and it’s a wonder nobody was injured, because all the walls on the floor are smashed,” Ivanov told Nova Television, where he works. He said he would not stop doing his stories, the latest of which uncovered prisoner abuse at Sofia Central prison.

The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) hopes to get a date for starting EU membership talks by the end of this year, but wants clearer conditions it has to meet, its top official in charge of European integration said yesterday. The Balkan country, which in December became an official candidate for membership of the European Union, says negotiations could get under way in 2007 and plans to be ready to join by 2010. The EU’s executive Commission is later this year due to report on FYROM’s progress. “If the Commission report is favorable for Macedonia I am hopeful that the EU could make a decision on a date of negotiation by the end of the year,” Deputy Prime Minister Radmila Sekerinska told Reuters. (Reuters)