“Impossibly blue skies, a wild and dramatic coast, and warm Mediterranean waters lapping at your feet welcome to Albania,” gushed Condé Nast Traveler this month. Come, experience the Maldives for £25 ($32) and get that “Bora Bora feeling” enticed British tabloid the Mirror in mid-August. Isolated during the Cold War and its aftermath until the 1990s, Albania has long been an afterthought by tourists who crowd into nearby Croatia or Greece, partly because for years it was seen as a relic of Soviet-era dictatorship that descended into blood feuds and civil war in 1997. Not anymore – it’s ripe for development, say Albanian officials, setting off a fight between onservationists and those pushing for economic development.
This tug-of-war centers on an area in southern Albania, specifically the isolated island of Sazan, once an Albanian military base during the Cold War. The son-in-law of former President Donald Trump, former White House official Jared Kushner, and his Saudi-backed equity firm, Affinity Partners, are looking to invest $1 billion in new luxury resorts, starting with this region, Bloomberg reported.
The firm is also focusing on the Zvërnec Peninsula, part of the Vjosë River delta ecosystem that is not only Europe’s last wild river but also its most intact and critical river delta, environmentalists say.
Kushner’s interest in Albania came from a visit in 2021, where he became “intrigued” by the region, he told Bloomberg. He added that the project of 10,000 hotel rooms and villas would respect the environment and be “very sustainable.”
Albania, one of the poorest countries in Europe, and one where many young people leave to find jobs abroad because of a lack of opportunities at home, says it needs more investment. Some locals, like the southern coastal city of Vlorë’s mayor, Ermal Dredha, want the development to move forward: “Without the investments, how (are we) going to attract all these people coming here, choosing Vlorë?” Other supporters say it would be great if the development would restore and revitalize the area.
But not everyone here is happy about this new development. “I know tourism brings growth,” said Kostaq Konomi, the head of the nearest village to the delta. “But if you are building something new, you are also destroying something.”
Opponents worry because this region is loved by locals for its quiet, pine forests, olive trees and walking trails hosting the endangered Albanian water frog and loggerhead turtles on its sand dunes, while flamingos and pelicans stop for breaks here on their migration routes, Reuters reported.
“We are constantly getting requests from visitors to visit these zones, but if this zone is turned into another urban area, there will be nothing special here but just another area turned into concrete,” ornithologist Jon Vorpsi of Protection and Preservation of Natural Environment in Albania, the country’s first environmental organization, said in an interview with the newswire.
Locals worry that Kushner’s “Trump villas,” as locals call the development, will also open itself to other projects in the unspoiled area and destroy its cultural heritage, too. Already a new international airport is under construction on the salt marshes nearby to accommodate what officials hope will be up to a million tourists arriving annually. It’s set to open next year in spite of environmental lawsuits against it.
Last year, the Albanian government created the Vjosë Wild River National Park and said it was off-limits for development, Yale E360, an environment publication, reported. Now the government says the protection doesn’t cover the delta and changed the law this year to allow it to bypass environmental protection provisions in the area.
Regardless, Prime Minister Edi Rama blasted his environmental critics, saying they are “raving about the destruction of an imaginary national park that has never been a protected area.” And, he added, get used to it: “Albania is the new rising star of tourism in the Medite
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