This week” returns with a new season, Artan Hoxha: Ergys Agasi’s arrest was organized to silence him

The “This Week” program returns to television this September with a new season, featuring figures, events and stories that have been at the center of current affairs in Albania. At the start of the new season, journalist and presenter Nisida Tufa invited renowned crime and investigative journalist Artan Hoxha to discuss the arrest of Ergys Agasi, an event that has sparked considerable debate in recent days.

Hoxha voiced reservations about the manner in which Agasi was detained and the timing of his arrest. According to him, the case cannot be viewed solely as an operation by SPAK, because if Agasi had been a direct target of the agency, he would have been arrested in December last year, not after 10 months.

The journalist focused on how the operation was carried out. He compared Agasi’s arrest with that of former President Ilir Meta, during which, he said, a Special Operations Team was used, cameras were positioned and an organized operation was conducted. In Agasi’s case, however, Hoxha said the arrest was carried out by Nazmi Bakalli, the driver of the Rapid Response Group of the Durrës Police Station, and Cenc Gashi, an Eagle police officer.

“In fact, Ergys Agasi’s arrest is not a matter for SPAK. If that were the case, they would have arrested him in December last year. After 10 months, his immunity was removed and he was left unprotected so that he could be arrested by the Rapid Response Group of the Durrës Police Station. A figure that powerful, with all that aura, connections and influence, is not apprehended by two officers from a rapid response group. That is what does not add up. The director could have made it more interesting,” he said.

Hoxha added that Agasi’s case may be the most filmed and documented arrest in Albania, claiming that wherever Agasi appeared, there was a police officer photographing him. He questioned how it was possible for a police officer who previously did not even dare mention Agasi’s name to stop him on the street.

According to the journalist, Agasi left Tirana for Elbasan, avoiding the highway route to Durrës and instead taking the route via the Elbasan side. Hoxha insisted that Agasi had not been hiding abroad and had remained in Tirana. He said Agasi’s movements showed that he was not behaving like someone afraid of being arrested. According to him, such a person would appear in public only if he felt safe.

“Why was Agasi convinced up to that point that they would not touch him? Because this was not simply a SPAK matter. The reports that he was moving around Durrës were true, but he could not be apprehended by a rapid response group. He was not someone who came from the criminal world, and he was not a typical gangster,” Hoxha said.

He described Agasi as a person to whom someone had delegated power, while emphasizing that this power had been used for actions that caused harm, and that his case had also served to show how relations between those in power and the people close to them operated.

Hoxha said that Agasi did not represent a problem for the criminal world, but for those in power. According to him, Agasi did not document the activities of criminal groups, but rather the way those in power dealt with the people beneath them. The journalist linked Agasi’s influence to high political levels, including Prime Minister Edi Rama, saying that Agasi had been close to the prime minister and was not part of the gang world. He also mentioned tenders and wine bottles as elements of how, in his view, this influence operated.

“He came from an intellectual family. Who delegated this power to him? The prime minister. Who removed his immunity? The prime minister,” the journalist said, also asking where the directors were that day. He said there were the Operational Forces, FAST, RENEA and the Rapid Intervention Forces for wanted individuals, adding that many people in power had breathed freely that day because a matter had been resolved for them.

According to Hoxha, Agasi was not someone expected to be arrested by an ordinary police group. He said the arrest had repeatedly been presented as important, but that the public could not accept that version without asking questions. In the journalist’s view, those in power had played a role in appointments and activities related to tenders, while the person who, he said, had carried out those actions ended up being apprehended by Cenc Gashi.

After the arrest, the first announcement was that Agasi would be sent to Durrës Prison, but he was later transferred to Qafë-Kashar. Hoxha said he did not know the reason for the change and also mentioned Bradashesh as an issue about which he had no clear information.

The journalist expressed skepticism about the possibility of Agasi cooperating with justice authorities. According to him, the arrest may have been carried out to silence him, and Agasi is expected to face the current charges, while another charge could be added along the way. Hoxha said that, up to that point, there had been no serious crimes involved and that Agasi could receive a 10-year sentence. With an expedited trial, according to his calculation, the sentence would be reduced to seven years; after taking pretrial detention into account, around four years would remain, while with two-thirds of the sentence he could serve less than two and a half years in prison.

“He does not have murders on his record, nor drug trafficking. This whole big Gysi has these charges, which may even be lighter than mine,” Hoxha said, referring to Ergys Agasi.

According to the journalist, Agasi would have been an interesting arrest if another political force had been in power, because in that case he might have spoken and cooperated with the investigation. But Hoxha argued that it was not in Agasi’s interest to speak, because every statement could worsen his position. He added that the balance surrounding Agasi had been disrupted long ago and that, since May last year, he had no longer been the coordinator.

Hoxha said the photographs and videos published after the arrest showed that Agasi had continued to stay in Tirana and that, if he had been worried, he would not have appeared in public. According to him, the decision to arrest him may have been taken at the highest levels of power out of fear that Agasi might speak.

“At this point, what happened to Gysi was meant to calm the people at the top of power. With Gysi inside, no one speaks anymore. The only one who continues to speak is Ben Ahmetaj in Lugano. Those who are inside no longer have the opportunity to speak. Whom would they denounce—the people holding the strings?” Artan Hoxha concluded.