BRUSSELS – The European Commission has cautioned Albania against actions that may impact its EU accession path, amid ongoing national protests over a Jared Kushner-linked project on the country’s souther coast, Politico reports.
The European Commission is warning that the project could put Albania on a collision course with the EU’s environmental rules, jeopardizing its ability to close the Chapter 27 in its accession talks.
Thousands of people have been protesting since the beginning of June, demanding that a construction project be abandoned.
Kushner’s company, Affinity Partners, is reportedly planning to build a luxury resort on the unihabited island of Sazan, a former military base in the Adriatic Sea. Construction is also planned on the opposite coast, in a protected area near the city of Vlora.
“Albania should refrain from actions that could undermine the fulfilment of the closing benchmarks and we expect the Albanian authorities to act without delay”, a European Commission spokesperson told Politico.
They added that in the EU accession process, as part of the closing benchmarks for negotiating Chapter 27 on environment and climate change, Albania is expected to align fully with EU legislation in this area, including the Birds and Habitats Directives.
Activists warn that the project would threaten the habitat of protected plant and animal species, while also pointing to alleged irregularities in the approval procedures.
The planned luxury resort is located in what was previously protect natural area inhabited by flamingos, more than 200 species of migratory birds, Mediterranean monk seals, and nesting sea turtles. Environmental organizations want that the project will threaten their habitats.
Controversial amendments to Albania’s Law on Protected Areas, adopted in 2024, opened the door to tourism development in certain protected locations, enabling the further expansion of a sector that has tripled in size over the past decade. However, no environmental impact assessment has been carried out for the disputed project.
Protests against the project have been growing while during the protests on 3 June, demonstrators clashed with police, who also used water cannons.
Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama has dismissed the growing protests against the planned resort as a “politically motivated campaign”, driven by critics of US President Donald Trump, arguing that the project poses no threat to flamingos or other wildlife species.
In an interview for Politico, Rama once again defended Kushner’s project, saying that his policy of attracting foreign investments to develop Albania’s tourism sector is the right one.
He rejected international criticism, claiming that the protests were nowhere near as large as they have been portrayed. He argued that “Trump haters” had helped amplify the protests, although he described the cause itself as a noble one.
