Page 7 - bne IntelliNews newspaper 14 July 2017

The Regions This Week
July 14, 2017 www.intellinews.com I Page 7
Southeast Europe
Prime Minister Edi Rama published a blacklist of Albania’s 100 least helpful public adminis- tration employees. Rama’s government is trying to tackle notoriously high levels of official cor- ruption in the country.
A politician known as “Bulgaria’s Trump” was charged with extortion. Businessman and Volya party leader Veselin Mareshki was charged in connection to business practices at his chain of pharmacies.
Macedonia will receive a €70mn grant from the EU to complete the construction of the Beljakovce- Kriva Palanka railway section that leads to Bulgar- ia. The line is part of pan-European Corridor VIII.
Turkey will pay $2.5bn for Russia’s advanced S-400 surface-to-air missile system (the “SA-21 Growler”). The preliminary agreement sees Tur- key receiving two S-400 missile batteries from Russia within the next year, and then producing another two inside Turkey.
Smaller cities in Bulgaria and Hungary are
more business-friendly than the two countries’ capitals, a World Bank report found. By contrast, Bucharest outperforms smaller cities in Romania.
Macedonia's government will cancel a gasifica- tion tender over corruption concerns. Just one company submitted documents in the tender
to build a secondary and tertiary gas network through a public-private partnership valued at around €150mn.
Workers at Serbia’s Fiat factories threatened to step up their strike after the government refused to guarantee they would not face conse- quences for striking. Fiat Chrysler Automobiles Srbija employees say they are overworked after hundreds of layoffs last year.
Moldova’s parliament endorsed a bill on bank supervision and prudential regulations that will
bring the regulatory framework into line with the Basel III principles. The bill is part of a wider overhaul of the banking sector.
Albania had the lowest number of cars per capi- ta in Europe in 2016, according to transport min- istry data. There were just 138.4 cars per 1,000 in Albania compared to the EU average of 497.
Two frigates and a submarine were deployed to monitor drilling activities off Cyprus in the east- ern Mediterranean. Turkey has vowed to take measures to prevent Greek Cypriot exploration for oil or gas around Cyprus.
Environmental NGOs complained to the Eu- ropean Commission over the environmental impact of building the Struma motorway in southwest Bulgaria. Part of the motorway will run through the Kresna Gorge, which is the most biodiverse region in Bulgaria, home to 92 pro- tected species, and part of the EU’s Natura 2000 network of protected areas.
Croatia and Slovenia remain at loggerheads over a border arbitration ruling. The ruling gives Slovenia access to high seas through the disputed Piran Bay, but Zagreb’s refuses to ac- cept the ruling after a Slovenian official was discovered trying to influence the outcome back in 2015.
More support is needed for Western Balkan SMEs, a senior EBRD official argued. EBRD vice president for policy and partnerships Pierre Heilbronn said the SMEs sector is “an engine for innovation in the region”, but companies often struggle to secure funding.
The number of passengers serviced by Croa- tia's airports rose 16% y/y to 897,000 in May. Growth slowed from April when the data sig- nalled a great start to this year's tourism season in April with a 33% y/y increase in air passengers to 570,000.