The case of former State Intelligence Service director Vlora Hyseni has attracted the attention of the Italian media, which view the SPAK investigation in the broader context of the challenges Albania faces in the fight against corruption and in the process of integration into the European Union.
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According to an analysis published by “Linkiesta,” news of Hyseni being placed under house arrest reached Tirana at a time when Prime Minister Edi Rama was in New York for the United Nations General Assembly.
Hyseni was placed under house arrest as part of a SPAK investigation and was subsequently dismissed as head of the service.
The article
By Linkiesta.it*/ Edi Rama was in New York for the United Nations General Assembly when news arrived from Tirana that Vlora Hyseni, director of Albania’s secret services, had been placed under house arrest. The Special Prosecutor’s Office against Corruption and Organized Crime (SPAK) accused her of aiding and abetting and disclosing classified information, and also ordered her suspension from office. Shortly afterward, Hyseni was dismissed as head of the services, at Rama’s own suggestion. The responsibilities remain unclear: the prime minister invoked the presumption of innocence, while adding that no one is above the law.
The case comes at a delicate stage for the government. SPAK has already accused Belinda Balluku, deputy prime minister and minister of Infrastructure and Energy until March, and for years one of Rama’s key aides. Balluku subsequently resigned from the government. The investigation involved several public procurement procedures and was later expanded to include other suspected crimes.
Moreover, since spring, the “pink flamingo” protests, which began against a major tourism project linked to Jared Kushner on the Zvërnec coast, have broadened their focus to include the development model promoted by the government.
All this is happening as Albania is advancing rapidly toward the European Union. Tirana has opened all 33 negotiating chapters and in May achieved the interim benchmarks for the “Fundamentals” cluster, which includes the rule of law and the functioning of democratic institutions. In July, the first 3 chapters were provisionally closed. A phase is now beginning in which Brussels will focus primarily on the implementation of reforms and the results they produce. Rama continues to cite 2030 as the target for accession.
SPAK emerged from the justice reform launched in 2016 during the “Rama” government, with the support of the European Union and the United States. Brussels values its results in the fight against high-level corruption, while continuing to call for progress in the most vulnerable sectors, including public procurement.
According to Giorgio Fruscione, a research fellow at ISPI, this situation reveals a twofold trend: “On the one hand, there remains a persistent and endemic problem linked to Albania’s political and institutional system: the widespread perception of corruption; on the other hand, SPAK itself shows that Albanian institutions, also thanks to the process of rapprochement with the European Union, have been equipped with tools capable of combating it.”
Investigations affecting Rama expose the government politically, but at the same time demonstrate the Special Prosecutor’s Office’s ability to act at the highest levels of power. The “Balluku” case has made this tension particularly visible. When the Special Court suspended the deputy prime minister from her duties in November 2025, Rama said the government would respect the decision but announced that it would appeal to the Constitutional Court. According to him, the suspension of a cabinet member by a judge raised the issue of judicial interference in the executive branch. The Hyseni case has now brought another investigation by the Special Prosecutor’s Office to the highest levels of government.
However, corruption enters the Albanian debate not only through prosecutors’ offices. It is also one of the accusations associated with the protests. The protests began in Zvërnec against a luxury resort reportedly linked to Jared Kushner, in an area of particular environmental value, and subsequently took on a broader political dimension. Protests over land management and procedural transparency were accompanied by criticism of Rama’s development model, which is based primarily on large-scale international investment, tourism and urban transformation.
For Fruscione, the timing of the protests does not appear to be accidental.
“Protesters have pointed the finger at government corruption and at what are perceived as murky relationships between politics, business interests and other networks in Albanian society. A protest that began around a real estate project has thus turned into a protest against the way the country’s development is being managed.”
And it is precisely on this issue that the flamingo protests intersect with the European path: many of the issues they raise, including decision-making transparency, the relationship between politics and economic interests, and the management of public resources, overlap with some of the issues on which Brussels continues to demand progress from Tirana.
In March, the European Commission recognized SPAK’s achievements in high-level corruption cases but called for further progress in vulnerable areas such as public procurement.
It also emphasized the independence of the judiciary and the need for further reforms concerning media freedom, freedom of expression and the safety of journalists.
Fruscione speaks of “a major dilemma for Brussels. On the one hand, some of Albania’s internal issues are running counter to the lines dictated by the Union; on the other hand, there is currently no structured political alternative offering the same guarantees for continuing the European journey.” Tirana aims to close all negotiating chapters by 2027, “a very ambitious goal” that will depend on Albania’s ability to implement the required reforms, but also on the Union’s ability to “maintain the momentum of the enlargement process and any reform of the process itself.”
The path to membership, therefore, begins with concrete progress: Albania has advanced rapidly in the negotiations and has created institutions that, as demonstrated by SPAK’s work, have acquired the ability to intervene even at the highest levels of power.
The challenge now is to consolidate these achievements and address the remaining issues. Investigations by the special prosecutor’s office and protests by the flamingos, while operating at very different levels, demonstrate some of the challenges this phase will face: the functioning of institutions, decision-making transparency, and the relationship between politics, economic interests and society.
