Despite promises made over the course of several decades, citizens still suffer consequences of the extreme pollution of the air, the land, and the river. Author: Andrea Danglli, Benard Neza,…
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The most important fuel distribution companies in the country appear to be trading, for the overwhelming part, gasoil mixed with mazut or kerosene, while the product refining is not done…
Author: Antonio Cakshiri, Joel Cela, Lorin Kadiu For more than a decade, experts have sought and requested the rehabilitation of the area surrounding the capital’s drinking water reservoir through afforestation,…
A survey conducted by the Albanian Center for Quality Journalism reveals that 75 percent of young journalists don’t get paid for the employment trial period, even though this is a…
An investigation conducted by the Albanian Center for Quality Journalism has identified at least 80 unlicensed brokerage companies, which operate in Albania and defraud foreign citizens, evade taxes and expose…
Author: Antonio Cakshiri, Denis Tahiri, Jackie DeFusco A young Ekrem Bardha fled Albania in June 1953 when it was under Communist control and eventually ended up in the United States.…
Author: Ardit Hoxha, Diana Kruzman, Margaux Maxwell, Shelby Grebbin In the Kune Vain Lagoon of northern Albania, a grim relic sinks into the past to reveal an even more uncertain future.…
Author: Elsa Cerpja, JD capelouto, Lorin Kadiu In last year’s Albanian elections, a company based in the northwest city of Lezhë donated 501,000 lek-worth (about $4,600) of fuel to a small…
Author: Elsa Cerpja, JD capelouto, Lorin Kadiu Albanian political parties last year paid nearly 30 million Albanian lekë ($277,800) to lobbying firms in the U.S. to gain influence and access…
Author: Blerina Allushi, Fjori Sinoruka, Josh Coe In 1998 Genti Daci saw opportunity in Albania–or at least the lack of internet access in the post-communist country. Less than a decade after…
Author: Fjori Sinoruka Road and drainage system works, the city’s cleanup, purchase of fruits and vegetables for kindergartens and dormitories have a common denominator in Elbasan Municipalities: the companies that…
Even though there is fear that the fuel price will increase up to 200 lekë per liter, fuel is also sold below-cost, damaging the engines of the cars. Author: Denis…
Roma children from Albania are forced to beg on the streets of Kosovo with neither their parents nor the authorities prepared to take responsibility for their right to safety, to…
The State Police and the Guard of the Republic, where dual employment is forbidden by law, declared that during the last five years they didn’t highlight any case that proves…
In the last 20 years, 151 people have lost their lives and 851 have been injured from explosive military surplus, in a time when the danger in certain areas is…
Current and former Members of Parliament, as well as Ministers and former Ministers choose to school their children in private institutions with the common denominator being the high tuition fees,…
Urban buses can show you the map of Berlin, but they can’t explain where a pregnant woman should sit
Author: Rakela Hunci As soon as you get on the bus that connects Nish Tulla with the center of Durres, you face a poster with this message written: “Attends le…
The musical offers on the streets of homeland make you ask yourself: “Am I hearing this right?” Author: Rakela Hunci Saturday mornings, the only place where she would drag herself…
Lana flows through Tiranaa in its most crutial neighborhoods. In the first article of this series, we will show how the Lana river has turned into a septic tank in…
Due to delays, the government ousted the company building Lana’s water treatment plant. Now, the company has sued Albania in London and that’s what holds the plant hostage. Author: Fjori…
Author: Mariglen Murrja Air Albania was introduced by the Albanian government as a promise of lower prices for customers, but 10 months after the first flight, the company cannot be…
Author: Melsena Danglli In early April 2019, the Government set up a new police structure, the Illyrian Guard, which would operate in the market as a trading company to provide…
Thousands of apartments are in stock, thousands more in construction Author: Gersi Kokonozi In Tirana, land is already expensive and those who buy to build are turning to the skies.…
$3.7 million was spent to equip 47,000 students around Albania with electronic tablets – now, those tablets are forgotten by students and teachers, unused. The plan was grand. In 2014…
Author: Anxhela Ruci, Klevis Paloka, Nkiruka Omeronye Companies that employ tens of thousands of Albanian youths show a dark side of neglect about their employees’ physical and psychological health. Migena…
Author: Elsa Dautaj The reason for this rejection from one of the at least 35 “companies” that offer masks through Facebook and Instagram were two questions. I got the answer…
Author: Gersi Kokonozi, Jona Kaso, Neada Mucaj For more than 70 years since its construction, Qemal Stafa Stadium has served as the main stadium in Albania, the home of the…
Author: Elsa Dautaj The 15 million Euro project to transform the “carcinogenic” waste field of Porto-Romano into an ecological park for the city of Durres is shrouded in suspicion of…
Isolation during the quarantine period has encouraged and increased the use of antidepressants. Author: Enejda Groshi, Jurgen Bame According to some pharmacies surveyed in Tirana, we learned that about 30%…
Author: Denis Tahiri The National Environment Agency and the Institute of Public Health report a reduction of up to 60% in air pollution in Tirana due to COVID-19 pandemic restrictions,…
Author: Merxhan Daci Gropa-Biza-Martanesh Mountain is a protected natural area, but despite this, it has often become a “favorite place” for logging activities. There have been many such cases and…
Author: Inva Hasanaliaj Ongoing promises and investments in millions of euros for plants have not yet solved the “gangrenous” problem of sewage pollution. Environmental experts criticize municipalities for lack of…
The only country in Europe without a prison-hospital for the mentally ill Author: Brejdon Xhavara Albanian courts regularly face various crimes such as murder, lethal assault, physical violence, etc., the…
Author: Denis Tahiri Often, before we buy, as we check the products we select in grocery stores or supermarkets, we ask ourselves: how safe are the foods we consume? Has…
Author: Inva Hasanaliaj “Black salt” is raw salt, which is taken directly from the salt production baths on the coast. It is called black because of the content of foreign…
Author: Elsa Dautaj Since 2012, the University of Tirana has installed the information system containing data of the students, the academic and administrative staff of the institution. This system was…
Author: Denis Tahiri “Difficult season, we are bleeding money”, this is the universal sentence that you can hear on the entire Albanian Riviera from businessmen who have invested in the…
Author: Enejda Groshi, Jurgen Bame Albania is facing an increase of people suffering from mental illness. In the last 5 years (2014-2018) in mental health institutions with beds there have…
One of the most beautiful rivers in the Albanian Alps, the river Cem, very soon risks being “prey” of 9 hydropower plants, damaging not only tourism, but also the future…
Author: Anxhela Braçja Aishe, 60 years old, is a resident of the city of Elbasan, and she regularly buys chicken wings (or chicken thighs) at the shop near the house.…
Author: Melsena Danglli It does not matter if you are a subscriber of Vodafone, ALBtelecom or ONE – again every month you have to pay at least 1 thousand ALL,…
Author: Jona Kaso A hydropower plant on the Devoll River received the permit in 2008, it took 10 years to build (although the contract was for one year) and has…
Author: Ardit Hoxha On the 27th of October of last year, Floresha Rasha was repatriated from the Al Hol camp in Syria together with her 4 children. Good news that…
Author: Alfred Zylyftari, Elsa Kotorri, Denisa Lazi The damage of the earthquake of November 26, 2019, was nothing compared to the ordeal of events that followed for the building Desla…
Author: Bejli Çaushaj “I received a gold diploma from my son, from an academy that has no building, no lecturers, but the building and the best lecturer is my son.”…
Author: Gëzim Hilaj Three years ago, Romana Vllahutin, former head of the EU delegation in Tirana from the village of Shishtavec in Kukes, called against the construction of hydropower plants.…
Author: Klivia Kafexhiu If you perform a simple search on the net, you can easily find information on the new or reconstructed schools with European Union funds in Albania. Finding…
Author: Gëzim Hilaj Musa Hila, 58 years old, resident in the Administrative Unit “Malzi” of Kukës, in 1992 planted 2 hectares of land with corn and beans and 1 acre…
Author: Bejli Çaushaj Lindita Rama leaves every morning towards the chrome stacks in Bulqiza with a pickaxe in her hand and her disabled husband by her side. The 53-year-old woman…
Author: Elsa Dautaj Resul Baleta and other residents of Gur i Bardhë village were called by the Municipality of Mat for public consultations, two years after the Municipal Council of…
Author: Ardit Hoxha Described as the “blue eye” of Berat, the source and canyon of Sinec is a protected area by decision of the Council of Ministers of 2002. In…
Author: Alfred Zylyftari, Elsa Kotorri On a cold February night, a farmer and his wife spent the night in the greenhouse lighting 500 candles at the roots of the seedlings…
Author: Klivia Kafexhiu In these November days with unusual temperatures and overcrowding in a city like Tirana, which is reaching nearly 1 million inhabitants, urban movement has become a challenge.…
Author: Alfred Zylyftari, Denisa Lazi, Hejli Haxhija With the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, Albania, like all countries in the region, faced an increase in the number of infected people,…
Author: Fatjon Baze, Klevis Paloka Most of Albanian soccer clubs have suffered a descent into informality over the years, as terms of contracts are ignored, pay is delayed for months…
Author: Klaudja Karabolli Termination of pregnancies – the use of the abortion pill seems to have gotten out of control, endangering lives of girls and women on a daily basis,…
Author: Cal Lundmark, Merxhan Daci The ancient city where once upon a time East and West collided, today is witnessing a stand off between concrete and ancient remains. Picture a…
Author: Chelsea Rae Ybanez, Emanuel Smaka, Inva Hasanaliaj A project aimed at supporting local production and preservation of traditional craftsmanship promised to reduce the number of imported souvenirs — but it…
Author: Xhuana Çallaku In the area of Kombinat, in Tirana, three years after the earthquake of November 26th, 2019, construction for the reconstruction of apartments has not started yet. Alfred…
Author: Armela Toska Mira Aliu, a resident of the Roma community in Shkoza, talks about the difficult living conditions of her family. Lack of food, unemployment and lack of basic…
Author: Dallandyshe Xhaferri “Drug use by high school students has become the norm. There have been cases where 9-year-old children have come to the hospital. These are special cases that…
Author: Ermal Spahiu The student card has not achieved its expectations since its release. In the last two years, students estimate that this card has not provided them with the…
Tahire Balla, 60 years old from Librazhdi, is a chronic asthmatic. In her house, the windows have been replaced with wooden boards. Throughout most of the apartment, mold is visible…
Authors: Armela Toska, Clara Bates and Grace Mayer Across Albania, one can find several foreign companies that have decided to open their doors despite persistent reasons to go elsewhere. Big…
In four years, 103 schools were closed, education fails to help the integration of returned children
Author: Anxhela Ruci Elisa Jakimi, is an 18-year-old from Dibra, who had to finish high school during the last school year, in order to continue her dream of higher education,…
Authors: Ardit Toca, Maria O’Donnell and Xhuana Çallaku “We showed them the fire, but they kept looking for smoke”… On April 11th of last year, two weeks before Albania’s Parliamentary…
Author: Anisa Tufa The National Education Strategy 2021-2026, drawn up with the support of UNICEF Albania for the Ministry of Education, Sports and Youth, cites that in 2018 and 2019…
Authors: Dallandyshe Xhaferri and Melissa Ellin For decades, Albania sent mentally ill convicts to Zaharia, an institution with a sole focus on providing therapy and treatment. However, the prison —…
Author: Allison Pirog Albania has looked to the international community for ways to eradicate judicial corruption, but experts say their solutions often lack local input and long-term thinking, missing elements…
Author: Julia Mallon Disinformation is a global problem. It is everywhere including the United States, where disinformation associated with the recent presidential election, pandemic, and vaccines has fueled the polarization…
Author: Denis Tahiri June once again brought Covid-19 to the attention of all Albanians. For the first time after several months of absence, in Albanian hospitals, loss of life from…
Author: Bejli Çaushaj A.H., age 60, is one of the thousands of Albanians waiting for justice. She once worked for the State Police in a high-level position but for the…
Authors: Alfred Zylyftari, Elsa Dautaj, Seth Facey There are many things Albanians know about the pandemic’s impact on their country. Albania was one of the first nations in Europe –in…
Authors: Amogh Matthews and Jona Kaso Despite the large number of hydropower plants that produce energy, Albania is still in the midst of an energy crisis with high energy prices…
Authors: Elsa Kotorri and Klesjana Omeri In Albania’s most recent parliamentary elections, due to pandemic restrictions, political parties used social media more than usual to expand their electoral campaign. They…
E-Albania “fails” in rural areas, where the population has limited to no access to the Internet. The elderly and the Roma community report discrimination and that employees from the local…
Author: Dallandyshe Xhaferri One of the daily problems of the capital is heavy traffic, gridlock in almost every hour. If public transport would work according to what is stated in…
Author: Denis Tahiri Until the day I saw the portrait of her 5-year-old daughter in one of the British medias, I had never taken seriously one of my best friends,…
Author: Ermal Spahiu Young people are giving too little space to reading. In the special survey, within this article, this fact was reinforced even more with the reality we face…
Author: Dallandyshe Xhaferri The number of followers on the official Facebook pages of the main political figures in the country reaches more than 1.6 million. More than half of the…
Author: Esmeralda Pashollari “Sentenced to 17 years of deprivation of liberty”, – this is the decision taken by the Tirana Court of Appeals two years ago for the citizen Q.N,…
Television and broader advertisements of pharmaceutical drugs, such as those without a doctor’s prescription, or food or medical supplements, have become a daily reality for the Albanian consumer, with television…
1.4 million square meters of construction permits granted in Tirana only during 2022. Experts talk about how illegal money manages to get into Albania from organized crime and how it…
It’s 2022. It’s been more than five years since the vetting process began, more than 3 years since a large number of judges have been dismissed due to their inability…
Two years after the entry into force of the law on the registration of the final beneficial owners of businesses in Albania, the deadlines for the registration of the latter…
“-How many people do you have? -25 -I want 25 app downloads – What is this? How can I force people? – This is not up for debate!” This conversation…
Author: Uendi Biba “Difficulties never end. I am left alone. I found myself here as I saw it as necessary and I had no other solution.” With these words, a…
According to the latest statistics from INSTAT, the number of accidents in the month of February this year was 88. This number has increased by 14.3% compared to February 2022.…
In the run-up to the local elections, the statements made by the mayor of Tirana regarding the flora situation in Tirana, especially the planting of 1 million trees in 5…
Dozens of students from the former University “Vitrina,” who graduated between 2011 and 2013, are facing a difficult situation where their diplomas are not recognized on the grounds that they…
The Law on the Right to Information was hailed at the time of its approval as one of the most innovative laws in the field of public transparency. However, after…
While thousands of Albanians wait for decades to legalize their homes and others end up in jail for “illegally“ building chicken coops and opening up window sills in their own…
Author: Marina Zela As another university year ends, one starts to reminisce on what happened 5 years ago, when students started asking for greater rights and services in their academic…
Author: Ernilda Luzi While inflation in food prices is a phenomenon that has affected the entire globe due to recent crises, Albania, unlike many EU countries, lacks tools to assist…
Like many cities in the ongoing transition to democracy, Shkodra has also been a victim of unregulated construction. However, while many cities are now revitalizing green spaces and increasing their…
While the promises of the Municipality of Tirana regarding the quality of public transportation have been approaching European standards over the years, the reality of the service is still far…