The European Parliament accused Albania of hastily pushing forward Trump's son-in-law's luxury resort project
Kyiv • UNN
MEPs accused the Albanian government of accelerating the promotion of Kushner and Ivanka Trump's resort in a protected area. Protests in Tirana have become more intense.
Members of the European Parliament accused Albania of using "underhanded" methods to accelerate the implementation of a luxury resort project linked to the family of US President Donald Trump. This is happening amid protests that are becoming increasingly violent, reports UNN, citing The Guardian.
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Although Prime Minister Edi Rama promised to "listen to the voices of young people" who had taken to the streets, he came under sharp criticism for ignoring demonstrators who had peacefully protested against the controversial project for a long time, the publication notes.
Events unseen in decades unfolded in Tirana: students leading the protest movement engaged in fierce clashes with riot police. Government buildings are on fire in the city, while banks and commercial properties have also been attacked and looted.
In a comment to The Guardian, Dutch MEP Tineke Strik accused Rama of exacerbating the situation through his persistent promotion of plans backed by Jared Kushner — the US president’s son-in-law.
"If the Albanian government had taken the ‘Flamingo Revolution’ seriously, we would not have found ourselves in this situation," she said, referring to the popular movement that emerged in response to the construction of the resort in environmentally vulnerable areas of the Balkan country. — "The students are voicing the dissatisfaction of people who feel that no one is listening to them."
On Monday, the capital saw municipal workers dismantling paving stones while shop owners boarded up their windows with metal sheets. This is the sixth consecutive day of violent clashes, during which protesters even set fire to a police station. Police used rubber bullets and tear gas in an attempt to disperse the crowd. The students said they would continue the protests until the socialist leader resigns — a demand he firmly rejected.
"This terrible idea for a resort was the spark that ignited the flames," says Greta, a student from Tirana. She adds that the slogan young people have been chanting at demonstrations over the past few months is: "Albania is not for sale."
"Now other problems have emerged that are fanning these flames even further. We are genuinely concerned about the state of our democracy, living standards and education."
To add
The article states that the controversial project involves the construction of up to 10,000 villas in coastal areas that were previously protected for environmental reasons. The situation changed after the government adopted an odious law allowing "strategic investors" to build in the Vjosa-Narta landscape — an area surrounding the last intact delta system in the Mediterranean.
In June, the European Parliament called on Albania — a candidate country for EU membership — to repeal the law, stressing that it poses a direct threat to the environmental standards that are a "necessary condition for accession" to the European Union.
The European Parliament’s move came in response to the start of construction work in May. The event triggered a wave of protests across the country, particularly after it emerged that ancient dunes and forest had been destroyed to lay access roads in a nature reserve.
Edi Rama, who was re-elected last year to an unprecedented fourth term, has set himself the goal of bringing this Balkan state — which, even more than three decades after the fall of communism, remains one of the poorest in Europe — into the EU by 2030. In an address broadcast on social media on Sunday, Rama asked: "Albanians should make a clear choice: what exactly do they want — this, that, or EU membership after all?"
However, Tine Strik, a Green MEP who led a fact-finding mission to Albania in June, said it was obvious that the government was rushing to “create facts on the ground” while its activities were not yet governed by EU standards. Albania, one of the leaders in the EU enlargement process, hopes to conclude accession negotiations by the end of 2027.
Citing an environmental impact assessment — whose “scientific findings” Rama recently called the decisive basis for implementing the €4 billion project — Strik said: “The government submitted an environmental documentation package to the European Commission, but it did not repeal the law that allows construction in the protected zone... It is still trying to facilitate the implementation of Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner’s megalomaniacal plans to create a luxury resort. How exactly? By conducting an accelerated impact assessment. If this study had been carried out [more thoroughly], it could under no circumstances have led to the conclusion that such construction was permissible.” This month, speaking at a tourism forum in Brussels, Rama said the landmark project would radically transform the situation in a country that, until the fall of the Stalinist regime in the 1990s, had been “the North Korea of Europe.”
“If construction begins, it will not be decided in the streets but by scientists,” he said at the forum. “The idea that nature will take care of itself if we simply look on is absurd and outdated. We want to create... a high-end tourist destination where nature will be the focus, where people can relax, and where the Albanian people will receive what they deserve: a much stronger economy.”
On 8 October, Kushner described the project as having a single goal: “To build a facility in accordance with the highest standards of design and environmental norms, and to make this extraordinary part of Albania greener, richer in biodiversity and more environmentally sustainable.”
The media outlet notes that private contractors tasked with conducting the environmental impact assessment have been observed mapping, measuring and monitoring the area. In response, environmentalists who initiated the original protests said this week that “science has already spoken.”
“It spoke back in 2004, when experts from the Faculty of Natural Sciences at the University of Tirana decided to place this incredible landscape under protection,” said Aleksander Trajce of the country’s oldest environmental organisation, Protection and Preservation of Natural Environment in Albania (PPNEA). “Their decision was based on very thorough scientific data. Science can no longer tell us anything new. Reviving the discussion is not only insincere but also evidently an attempt to justify construction that should not be taking place at all.”
Emphasising that a proper environmental impact assessment would require “at least two years”, he added: “Several seasons over several years are needed to properly study the species and biodiversity of this region.”
According to Trajce, as the violence continues, Albanians feel deep outrage over the EU’s sluggish stance. “If the EU had intervened earlier and urged Rama to stop, the peaceful phase of the protest movement would not have turned into what we are seeing today.”
Strik, who admitted that she was surprised by the Albanian prime minister’s enthusiasm for creating such a large-scale tourist complex in such a vulnerable area, stressed the importance of protecting similar unique coastal zones on a continent that has already learned from the mistakes of the past. “I accuse Rama of acting in the interests of — his own and Kushner’s — rather than those of the environment or the Albanian people,” she said.
"The government apparently intends to complete all procedures by the time it is legally obliged to comply with EU standards. Such insidious and unscrupulous actions must be firmly condemned by the EU. If Albania genuinely aspires to be a reliable candidate for EU accession, it must respect EU legislation rather than trying to circumvent it." Commenting on Strik’s statements, Rama told The Guardian: "Please tell the honourable lady that the violence in Tirana is very real. Instead of inventing environmental conspiracies that do not exist, she could help Albania by condemning the violence — violence that she appears to endorse, which regrettably makes her resemble a representative of the Kremlin, Ms Zakharova [Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova]."