Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama has described his recent remark about U.S. President Donald Trump as a joke, stating that it is unfair to take it seriously.
Earlier, Trump had confused Armenia with Albania in an interview. Responding to that, during the 7th summit of the European Political Community held on October 2 in Denmark, Rama jokingly asked French President Emmanuel Macron why he hadn't congratulated him on making peace with Azerbaijan, referencing Trump’s slip.
“It’s truly amazing how today’s media operates and how so-called 'virality' can distort reality so easily. A comment made humorously and in a friendly tone suddenly becomes a global headline, while the true context is lost,” Rama wrote on social media, as reported by Sputnik Armenia.
He added that it had been a pleasure to meet his old friend Ilham Aliyev and to jokingly reference Trump’s error in Macron’s presence, the claim that even Albania had made peace with Azerbaijan, despite Macron’s long-standing efforts to mediate between Armenia and Azerbaijan.
“It was just a light remark, a friendly moment. Of course, it’s no big deal that it spread, but turning it into a political jab is simply unfair. Let’s clarify the situation: the truth is that President Trump showed leadership by reintroducing the word 'peace' into the West’s vocabulary after years, achieving peace in places where others had tried and failed, and he continues to pursue it tirelessly,” Rama emphasized.
He concluded by saying the exchange had been merely “a good moment of humor” among people who, in his view, are among Trump’s most trusted supporters.
Trump has repeatedly confused Armenia with Albania in public remarks. On September 22, he claimed to have stopped “Albania’s terrible war” with Cambodia. On September 18, during a joint press conference with UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer, he again confused the two countries while discussing Azerbaijan. A similar mix-up occurred in a Fox News interview on September 12 and again in August during a conversation with American journalist Mark Levin.
