The killing of a Portuguese tourist at a luxury club in Ksamil has brought to light a problem that has remained in the shadow of Albania’s rapid coastal development for years—the penetration of criminal capital into tourism and the weakness of the institutions responsible for monitoring it.
Të lidhura
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In mid-August, Ksamil is one of the most overcrowded places in Albania. The village streets fill with cars bearing foreign license plates, music from the bars continues into the early hours of the morning, and the small beaches facing the islands—surrounded by hotels, restaurants and clubs—compete for tourists arriving from across Europe.
Luis Miguel Varela Mendes was one of them.
The 20-year-old Portuguese man had come to Albania on holiday as part of a group of friends. In the early hours of August 18, he was at “Tortuga Bay,” also known as “Principotes,” a luxury tourist facility facing Ksamil’s three islands.
At around 5:15 a.m., following a conflict with several people, Mendes was fatally stabbed.
Online, the Principotes complex describes itself with the slogan “Hospitality as art.” But after the killing, another reality began to emerge about the hotel and its owner.
According to data from the National Business Center, the facility and its operations are owned by Kade Bulica, a 76-year-old woman. She is the mother of 36-year-old Bekim Bulica, who was declared wanted after the incident for “failure to report a crime.” The company extract shows that Bulica registered the business in January 2022, with initial capital of 100,000 lekë.
Her son was known to police
Edvin Ndreu, director of the Vlora Police, told BIRN that Bekim Bulica had been prosecuted for crimes against individuals after previously being involved in the assault of a police officer and his brother in Tirana. He is also reported to have had other problems with the law.
For the security of “Principote,” Bulica’s mother had hired an employee of the Gjirokastër Border Police, an employee of the Fier Prison Police and an employee of the Gjirokastër Municipal Police, while a fourth person worked as a bodyguard.
When the conflict that ended with Mendes’s killing broke out, they were there.
According to police, they did not intervene or notify the authorities. All four were detained for failing to report a crime and failing to take measures to prevent illegal activity.
Security and tourism experts say the Ksamil case raises broader questions about checks on individuals and the source of the funds behind the tourism investments transforming the Albanian coast.
A threat to public order and security
For years, Albania’s coastline has been a vast construction site. New hotels, resorts, apartments, beach bars and restaurants have sprung up from Velipojë to Ksamil.
Experts consider the management of resorts or tourist facilities by people with criminal records or members of organized crime to be a threat to public order and security.
“These venues often become logistical operational bases, where illegal weapons possession, the concealment of wanted individuals and clashes between rival groups are transferred into public and tourist spaces,” says former prosecutor Eugen Beçi, describing these places as “legally unprotected zones.”
According to him, serious incidents at accommodation facilities are not simply isolated crimes, but a direct exposure of citizens and tourists to risks to their lives, carrying a heavy cost for the country’s public order and economy.
Redion Qirjazi, executive director of the Mary Ward Loreto Foundation, a nonprofit organization working to combat human trafficking and protect victims of this criminal activity, observes that large tourism businesses have created “lawless zones” in the country.
“According to reports and the findings of SPAK itself, these structures operate not only as businesses but also as territories under the control of structured criminal groups,” Qirjazi said.
According to him, the tragic incident in Ksamil, in which the Portuguese tourist was killed, shows that staff are unqualified and, in some cases, act as a violent “private police force” that replaces the state.
“These units can acquire this ‘boldness’ only if they believe they can act above the law,” he said.
Qirjazi notes that these incidents also involve the compromising of state structures.
“The involvement of police or prison employees who work as private security at these hotels and clubs—for financial or other reasons—compromises the professionalism and integrity of state employees, seriously calling into question their ability to enforce the law when that ability directly affects the business of their private employer,” he stressed, adding that these circumstances demonstrate the State Police’s inability to monitor its ranks when officers take second jobs in positions that are not permitted.
According to Qirjazi, such incidents seriously damage the image of security and tourism, drive away serious foreign investors and risk prompting travel warnings from EU countries.
“Ordinary crime happens everywhere, but serious crime leaves an irreversible impact on a country’s image,” he said.
Organized crime in tourism
In SPAK’s accounts of assets seized from members of organized crime and people linked to them, hotels—located mainly along Albania’s coast—make up a considerable number. In the first seven months of 2026 alone, SPAK reported that preventive seizure orders had been placed on assets worth 440 million euros, which are suspected of having been created with financial resources obtained through illegal activities, mainly international drug trafficking.
According to former prosecutor Eugen Beçi, the tourism and construction sectors provide ideal grounds for laundering the proceeds of crime.
He says the reasons are entirely practical and relate to the high circulation of physical money—cash—as well as the large seasonal volume that allows undeclared income to be justified through fictitious invoices or artificially inflated daily turnover.
“The construction of resorts and hotels enables dirty money to enter the legitimate economic cycle, moving from informal cash into high-value real estate assets,” Beçi said.
He added that another reason organized crime invests in this sector is the ease with which such businesses can be established and managed by associates or under fictitious names, creating legal barriers to tracing the real beneficial owner.
Eva Rama, chairwoman of the Albanian Association of Tour Operators, ATOA, said that although isolated incidents such as the one in Ksamil affect the tourism sector, they should not be used to generalize about an entire sector.
According to her, what is concerning for tourism is when tourist facilities turn out to be owned or controlled by people linked to criminal activity.
“At this point, we are no longer dealing only with a public-order issue or a criminal incident that occurred at a hotel, but with a problem that also affects the credibility and image of the sector,” she said, emphasizing that tourism is particularly sensitive to perceptions of safety.
“When a destination begins to be associated with serious criminal incidents and facilities linked to people with criminal pasts, this clearly does not serve the image Albania is seeking to build as a tourist destination,” Rama said, listing several problems that arise when organized crime owns tourism assets.
According to Rama, such a reality distorts competition, because businesses operating with legitimate capital do not compete on equal terms with structures where capital of criminal origin may be circulating.
She said this undermines confidence in the market and in tourism investment itself.
“When such cases become recurrent and attract public or international attention, they also affect perceptions of safety and Albania’s image as a destination,” Rama observed.
Nevertheless, Rezart Shehu, a consultant on the management of tourism facilities, described the August 18 incident as isolated.
“This was a very serious incident, but in my view it should be treated as an isolated event, not as an indication that Albanian tourism as a whole is unsafe,” Shehu said.
“Criminal incidents also occur in other tourist destinations in the region and Europe, and this does not automatically mean that the entire tourism sector of that country is problematic,” he added.
Shehu blames state institutions for allowing funds of illegal origin to be invested in the tourism sector.
“If there are indications or information relating to the source of wealth, criminal activity or the use of a business for illegal purposes, institutions must have the capacity and mechanisms to identify and control the situation,” he said.
“Otherwise, a space is created in which capital of questionable origin can be invested and laundered through rapidly growing sectors, including tourism,” Shehu stressed.
Measures that are lacking
Experts say state institutions should verify the sources of the financial assets invested in tourism, as well as in every other sector.
“The Ministry of Tourism and the State Police must cooperate with SPAK to conduct strict checks on the origin of capital before granting any license for hotels or beaches,” Qirjazi said, adding that measures should be taken to prevent State Police employees from working as physical security in private businesses, while private security structures should also be reformed.
According to him, measures must be strengthened in cases involving illegality, including the freezing of accounts and the revocation of licenses on grounds of endangering public safety.
Former prosecutor Eugen Beçi also believes that confronting this phenomenon requires coordinated intervention between financial investigations and on-site administrative oversight.
“Financial investigations should not begin only after incidents involving weapons, but should be conducted proactively and in parallel for every major investment where the investor’s financial profile does not correspond to their declared legitimate income,” he observed.
According to Beçi, there must be thorough verification by the Directorate for the Prevention of Money Laundering and the tax authorities; a legal filter for tourism licenses through an administrative decision with strong integrity criteria; and increased police oversight of the security of the premises.
Tourism-sector experts also blame state institutions for the situation that has emerged.
“Oversight must begin with transparency regarding the real ownership and source of financing, particularly for major investments, and must continue with tax controls and the actual enforcement of anti-money-laundering legislation,” said ATOA Chairwoman Eva Rama.
“The state has the instruments to do this; the issue is ensuring that they function and are applied equally to everyone,” she added.
Shehu also believes Albanian tourism needs greater institutional professionalism, equal enforcement of the law, transparency and infrastructure support.
According to him, this would protect not only tourists but also responsible operators who invest and work every day to develop Albania’s image as a tourist destination./BIRN
