The EU's preferred university is expanding to the Balkans. 
Enlargement Commissioner Olivér Várhelyi announced that the College of Europe - the training ground for aspiring Eurocrats - will open a new campus in Tirana, Albania, a sign that the Balkan country is getting closer to joining the EU. This move is seen by regional experts as an attempt by the bloc to increase its soft power in a key geopolitical region. 
Albania is a candidate country for the EU and is in the process of aligning with EU rules and carrying out reforms to meet the bloc's membership criteria. 
The new campus will be funded by the Commission, and applications for students will open in September 2023, according to Várhelyi. He added: "The only thing we need now is a building, a beautiful place [for the college]." 
Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama welcomed the news as a "great gift" and something "extremely important and meaningful for us" at a joint press conference in Tirana with the EU's foreign policy chief Josep Borrell and Várhelyi. 
"After the College of Bruges opened a campus in Poland in the 1990s to support those countries that become members of the European Union, it will now open a campus in Albania," Rama said, referring to the opening of a second campus in Natolin, Poland, in 1992, as a region committed to European integration after the fall of communism. 
The symbolic significance of Tirana's move was not missed by Várhelyi, who described it as a "clear signal that [Albania's] accession is near, as happened in Poland." In a written statement to POLITICO, the Rector of the College of Europe - and former EU foreign policy chief, Federica Mogherini "welcomed the Commission's announced intention to fund a new College of Europe campus in Tirana." 
She added: "We are starting the preliminary work to present a detailed proposal." 
The Presidents of the European Commission and Council - Ursula von der Leyen and Charles Michel - supported Albania's calls to establish a new campus during a summit of EU leaders in Tirana last December. 
On Thursday, Rama refused to set a final deadline for Albania's EU accession, but indicated that his country could join the club "within the next decade," something he acknowledged would have been unimaginable just a few years ago. 
The university is the most represented alma mater among EU civil servants, according to a POLITICO ranking, and its alumni include the current commissioner Margaritīs Schinas as well as former prime ministers of Denmark and Finland, Helle Thorning-Schmidt and Alexander Stubb.
The university is partially financed by the EU and other national governments, according to its data. / Source: Politico.eu