Albania’s Constitutional Court has overturned parliament’s impeachment of President Ilir Meta for allegedly inciting instability and showing bias before the country’s parliamentary election last year.

The court said in a ruling issued late on Wednesday that the evidence against Mr Meta did not amount to “a grave violation of the constitution”, which is a legal threshold for discharging a sitting president.

In June last year, Albanian politicians voted 104-7 to impeach Mr Meta after a parliamentary investigation concluded he had violated 16 constitutional articles and incited violence with his bias against the ruling Socialists during campaigning for the April 2021 election.

Mr Meta, whose term ends in July, had denounced the investigation and impeachment, arguing they were illegal.

“ZERO SURPRISE for the president’s office! This issue should not have started!”, his spokesman, Tedi Blushi, wrote on Facebook after the Constitutional Court handed down its decision. The ruling is final.

The impeachment process was launched by 49 governing Socialist politicians who accused Mr Meta, a former Socialist prime minister who left the party years ago, of inciting instability and violence in the Balkan nation and siding with the political opposition ahead of the election.

The Socialist Party ended up winning 74 of parliament’s 140 seats to earn a third four-year term governing Albania.

Albania’s presidency is largely ceremonial but carries some authority over the judiciary and the armed forces. The role is also generally understood to be apolitical, but Mr Meta has regularly clashed with the Socialist government.

Since becoming president in 2017 with the support of the Socialists, he has opposed their agenda and blocked nominations of ministers.