As part of his agenda in Seoul, South Korea, Prime Minister Rama attended the opening ceremony of the Asian Leadership Conference, held under the theme “Out of Turbulence – Toward a New Balance” — a globally influential platform for the exchange of ideas, the strengthening of trust, and the building of bridges of cooperation among countries and different generations.

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We now have the great honour of inviting our distinguished guests to deliver their welcoming remarks.

Please welcome Mr. Edi Rama, Prime Minister of Albania, with a big round of applause.

Prime Minister Edi Rama: It is a deeply personal privilege to be here in Seoul. The first time I saw this cinematic city was more than two decades ago, as the Mayor of Tirana, the Capital city of Albania. I came from a lost city searching for itself, in a country emerging from one vanished world and trying, often chaotic, to imagine another.

What I found then was already remarkable.

But what I see today, returning after all these years, is something profoundly moving. Korea is proof that history matters, but that history alone does not decide destiny. And perhaps nowhere has this truth been illustrated more strikingly than here, on this peninsula. Same people. Same culture. Same history.

And yet, divided by radically different systems, they became one of the clearest demonstrations on Earth that the fate of nations is shaped not simply by where they begin, but by the choices they make along the way.

One Korea became a symbol of renewal through openness, democratic resilience, and innovation. The other became a symbol of darkness through isolation, the rule of force, and fear.

For me, this has never been an abstract lesson. Because Albania, for a painful chapter of its history, was the North Korea of Europe. And yet today, Albania walks another path. Not an easy one, imperfect of course, but profoundly different. A path of institution-building. A path of democratic modernization.

A path toward the European Union. We are, in our own way, proving that democratic institutions can be built even where history says they cannot, and that a country once defined by isolation can become defined by aspiration.

And that is one of the reasons being here in Seoul feels so meaningful to me. Although far geographically, South Korea feels deeply close to countries like mine through its reminder that greatness is not reserved for those born into fortune.

It can also belong to those who dare to rebuild, who choose openness over fear, determination over resignation, and optimism over fatalism. While we were locked behind our walls chanting revolutionary songs under the spell of China’s Cultural Revolution and fighting imaginary wars against both the Americans and the Soviets, something entirely different was unfolding across this continent, something we could neither see nor were allowed to know.

Japan was rebuilding itself into an industrial marvel. South Korea was transforming poverty into precision engineering. Singapore was proving that a city with no natural resources could outshine nations blessed with every advantage. Taiwan, Malaysia, Thailand, each writing its own chapter, on its own terms and in its own voice.

Albania parted ways with China precisely when Deng Xiaoping began dismantling ideological orthodoxy with a sentence that sounded almost heretical to us at the time: it does not matter what colour the cat is, as long as it catches mice.

Albania remained faithful to doctrine. China chose pragmatism. And history moved with China.

Perhaps most remarkably of all, these nations, despite immense differences in culture, systems, histories, and political traditions, found a way to build something together. ASEAN was not born from sameness. It was born from the understanding that cooperation is more powerful than confrontation, and that pragmatism ultimately defeats ideology.

China too eventually found its place within that conversation, no longer as the exporter of permanent revolution, but as part of a regional architecture capable of absorbing complexity without either collapsing under it or living in constant anticipation of the other side’s collapse.

I wish that all the wisdom of leadership accumulated in this part of the world could serve my part of the world as a humbling source of knowledge on how to navigate differences not as reasons for conflict, but as forces of balance, in the mutual interest of progress and prosperity for every society involved.

There is a Korean saying I heard and loved: after the rain, the ground hardens.

Few countries in the world embody this better than Korea. Here, hardship did not soften the ground beneath the nation. It made it firmer. With national determination. And also with creativity.

I had the privilege of becoming friends with Min-Suk Cho, one of the greatest architects of our time, whose work I admire enormously, and who is also contributing to projects in Albania. And through that friendship, I have been reminded that even countries separated by continents can sometimes confront strikingly similar challenges.

How do we preserve identity while embracing transformation? How do we build for the future without losing the depth of our memory? How do we solve urban, social, and human problems by looking at our different pasts through the eyes of our common future?

And sometimes, incredibly, a creative mind from the other side of the world can help illuminate answers to questions we tend to think are uniquely our own.

Over the years, whether as mayor or later as Prime Minister, I have learned that leadership is far less about certainty than we often pretend. It is rarely about having the comfort of clear answers.

More often, it is about moving forward with imperfect knowledge, accepting doubt, learning constantly, and still finding the courage to act.

Because true leadership does not belong to the spectator, comfortably judging from a distance, nor to those who prefer inaction when confronted by a frightening challenge.

It belongs to the one who enters the arena, not because he is certain of coming out victorious, but because he dares greatly.

And in our world today, where commentary is often easier than responsibility, where criticism travels at the speed of light while construction demands days and nights, where half-truths, often the greatest lies, follow you at every single step, the courage to remain in the arena, to endure, to build, and to keep moving forward despite the noise, feels more relevant than ever.

Korea knows this. Looking at the two sides of Korea makes me recall an old anecdote about the difference between hell and paradise. In both places, people sit around a table full of food, holding long arrows that are too long to bring the food to their own mouths. In hell, everyone starves while desperately trying to feed themselves.

In paradise, they use the very same arrows to feed one another.

Korea’s journey is, in many ways, the story of a nation that entered the arena again and again, and where what did not kill it made it stronger, because it chose not merely to survive history, but to shape it, no matter the cost.

That is why being here is such a privilege.

So, I stand here today not to speak as someone offering lessons, but as someone still learning.

Learning from Korea. Learning from its example.

And grateful for the reminder that leadership, at its best, is not about standing above others. It is about entering the arena with enough humility to listen, enough courage to act, and enough imagination to build bridges where others only see distance.

It is still recent news that this country surpassed Japan in GDP per capita, an achievement that not long ago would have sounded like fantasy bordering on madness. And what makes this achievement so extraordinary is the capacity of a nation to turn pain into strength, hunger into determination, destruction into energy, and historical trauma into an almost unbelievable force of collective ambition.

If Korea could do it, then nobody has the right to say: it cannot be done, neither at the collective nor at the individual level. This is the great shining example of this nation, and I am grateful for it.

Feel blessed. And just do it.

Thank you.