Prime Minister Edi Rama recently conducted a tense interview with CNN , where he was asked about the protests in Albania and the debates surrounding the project related to the Zvërnec area.
During the interview, Rama rejected some of the journalist's reports and questions. "Fake news! Fake news!" he said, while saying that in Albania there is not a wave of protests across the country, but only a rally in the capital.
The Prime Minister also spoke of an “information attack” and “hybrid warfare,” saying that incorrect information is being spread on social media. He denied the existence of an approved project for the Zvërnec area, saying that it is currently only a phase of studies and environmental assessments.
But the question is where did Zvërnec's project come from that Rama considered "fake news"? This project was not invented by protesters, nor by social networks, nor by citizens demanding transparency.
The project was reported as early as March 2024 by Bloomberg , in an article about the plans of Jared Kushner and his company Affinity Partners in the Balkans.
According to Bloomberg , Affinity Partners was in advanced talks for three property investments in the Balkans that could be worth more than $1 billion. One of them was the island of Sazan, which was intended to be transformed into a luxury resort. Another was the Zvernec area, for which Bloomberg reported that the company was looking at the possibility of developing several resorts, with villas and hotel rooms, that over time could reach about 10,000 units.
The news was later covered by The New York Times, which reported that Jared Kushner was close to finalizing deals for real estate projects in Albania and Serbia. It also mentioned Zvërnec, a coastal area in southern Albania where, according to the plan, several hotels and hundreds of villas would be built.
The New York Times article also noted that the projects involved land controlled by the respective governments, so the agreements had to be finalized with them. Kushner was quoted as saying that the agreements were not yet finalized, but that they were “very close.”
As you can see below, on March 15, 2024, Jared Kushner himself posted some early images of the development projects on Instagram, writing that he was excited to share “early design images” for projects on the Albanian coast and in downtown Belgrade. In the post, he also tagged The New York Times and Bloomberg Business.
So, the plans for the Albanian coast were not only mentioned by international media, which, as far as we know, are reliable and appreciated. They were also publicly presented by Kushner himself, with images, description, and direct reference to international reports.
At the same time, Albanian media reported that Rama had welcomed the American company’s plans to invest in Albanian tourism. However, when Voice of America asked the Ministry of Tourism and Environment about the projects, the ministry confirmed Kushner’s company’s application for Sazan, but did not provide information about any concrete plans for Zvërnec.
Let's go back to the prime minister's interview with CNN. It's one thing to say that there is no approved project for Zvërnec today, because that may be true in a legal and administrative sense. A project may still be in the study phase, plans may have changed, and the investment may not be realized at all, but that's very different from calling the whole story a "fraud."
If the Zvërnec project with 10,000 rooms is “fake news”, then the question is very simple: who said it first? Because the information did not start from the public who read the news, nor from the protesters who repeated it. The information, which today Prime Minister Rama calls “fake news”, emerged from major international reports, after the investor’s own statements about his plans in Albania. Then, the investor himself published images of the projects on the Albanian coast.
Meanwhile, Albania was also changing the law on protected areas, a process that was viewed with concern by critics, as it would pave the way for so-called "elite tourism" investments in environmentally sensitive areas. This makes the question of why there was silence from institutions about Zvërnec even more important, while the investor was publicly talking about development plans on the Albanian coast.
To CNN, Rama treated the story as if “fake news” was invented by protesters, social media, or those who sought explanations for Zvërnec. But this is not correct, because citizens did not wake up one morning and decide to create a 10,000-room resort from scratch.
The information initially emerged from the investor himself, Jared Kushner, through his statements to Bloomberg and then through public posts about projects on the Albanian coast.
Therefore, if this story is truly misinformation, then the fault lies not with the citizens who read it and reacted, but with the investor who first said it. But apparently, it is convenient to call it "fake news" when the news turns into a problem.
