Albania's Rama rules out 2027 NATO summit in Tirana as alliance weighs annual-meeting reform

NATO will not hold its planned 2027 summit in Tirana, Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama said on Thursday while speaking in Dublin ahead of a gathering of European leaders.

Rama said there is not yet a common position on when the summit will happen, adding that "for sure not in 2027," and that "if it will be a summit in 2028, it will be in Tirana."

A NATO official confirmed that the next summit "will be held in Albania" but said no decision on the date has yet been made. The alliance has been considering ending its recent practice of holding annual summits, a shift that could spare it a potentially difficult encounter with US President Donald Trump.

Plans for a Tirana summit had already been under strain. Reuters reported in June that resistance from the Trump administration and dissatisfaction among NATO members with Albania's low defence spending had thrown the event into doubt. The declaration from NATO's June 2025 Hague summit had looked forward to a meeting in Turkey in 2026 "followed by a meeting in Albania", but the subsequent July summit in Ankara made no mention of a time or place for the next gathering.

Rama, who has held office for 13 years, faces mounting domestic pressure. Protests that began in May after he gave preliminary approval to a luxury resort backed by Jared Kushner in the protected Vjosa-Narta wetland at Zvernec and on nearby Sazan Island escalated into broader anti-corruption demonstrations — dubbed the "Flamingo Revolution" — and violent student protests in October over university conditions. Opposition lawmakers led by Sali Berisha disrupted a parliamentary session with flares and smoke bombs on October 29. Rama has refused to resign; his government has dismissed the protests as orchestrated by political rivals.