Vienna, 20.06.2022 – The Deputy Minister of Economy, Mentor Arifaj took part in the roundtable (meeting) organized by the Energy Community Secretariat, which was held in Vienna, Austria, and was attended by Mechthild Wörsdörfer, Deputy Director-General from the European Commission, Artur Lorkowski, Director of the Energy Community Secretariat, as well as representatives of the signatory states of the Energy Community.

Deputy Minister Arifaj stated before the audience that despite the fact that Kosovo is a country dependent on fossil energy sources, we as a country have consistently expressed our readiness to connect with countries in the region to move forward towards a gradual process of decarbonization by basing upon the principles set forth in the Sofia Declaration and the Clean Energy Platform adopted by the Council of Ministers in November 2021.
“As a country, we have recently been very active in the development of the energy sector and have given our contribution to the process of the latest study funded by the European Commission, and upon performing the analysis, we came up with a very ambitious objective aimed at independence from lignite and an increase of renewable energy sources to 32% of gross electricity consumption by 2030”, stated Arifaj.
Further, Deputy Minister Arifaj emphasized that, unlike previous target-setting processes, Kosovo is now in a more appropriate momentum as a result of the National Energy Strategy 2022–2031, which is nearing completion.