The European Union (EU) will be totally committed to provide assistance in the transformation of Albania's public administration as it sees such reform as an absolute priority for the opening of EU accession talks, EU Ambassador to Albania Romana Vlahutin Monday told reporters.

According to the EU ambassador, Albanian public administration must be ready when the talks with the EU are launched.

A country cannot be modernized without a public administration and Albania is no different to other countries. The reform in the public administration is one of the five key priorities that Albania has to meet in order to open accession talks, Vlahutin highlighted at a press conference.

Ambassador also said that the civil service reform was one of the significant reforms that served not only to capacity building of human resources or improvement of the service to the citizens, but even to the fight against corruption and nepotism.

In this regard, EU top official noted that fighting corruption in the judicial system, administration and education would contribute to a stronger economy.

Further on, Vlahutin voiced the EU commitment to support of reforms in Albania, highlighting that EU had already given 32 million euros (36.5 million U.S. dollars) for capacity building in Albanian administration.

On her part, Albanian Minister of Public Administration Milena Harito informed that administration reform would be a priority of the Albanian government in its second mandate.