'Corruption behind it': The Trump-Kushner mega-deal that has left a nation angry

Inside Albania anger is brewing at a level not seen since the fall of Communism.

The people are protesting for the preservation of a free and fragile paradise.

They’re also protesting against an allegedly "corrupt" government with ties to oligarchs and the underworld, as well as one name in particular … Trump.

Albania's Zvërnec Peninsula is framed by picturesque, tree-covered mountains and, in the distance, is the small island of Sazan which sits like a fortress at the edge of the Adriatic Sea.

The beach here is sparsely populated. 

Local fishermen lazily launch dinghies from the shallows, families relax under broad umbrellas, and a handful of local teenagers play football in the wet sand.

In the water between the coastline and the island swim endangered monk seals and rare loggerhead turtles.

Behind the beach lies the vast Narta Lagoon, a thriving ecosystem home to 200 species of precious birdlife — including flocks of flamingos that snack on the shrimp in the briny waters.

While much of the Mediterranean coastline is lined with luxury hotels, high-end shopping strips and packed beach clubs and bars, Zvërnec remains untouched by modern development.

It is why a controversial proposal has lit the wick for protests in the Albanian capital of Tirana.

"This is one of the last stretches of the Mediterranean that is void of intensive human intervention," Aleksander Trajce, an Albanian environmentalist, told 7.30.

"It's one of the last natural gems we have."

But Zvërnec's status as a wild, untouched paradise may soon be over after the Albanian government green-lit a $6.5 billion luxury resort to be built on the shores of the eastern side of Sazan Island and next to the Narta Lagoon.

Tender and draft design documents leaked online show plans for the opulent resort include thousands of rooms in a luxury complex, featuring a casino and a water park — with rooms and restaurants catered by Carbone, the chic, A-list New York Italian eatery.

Prestigious Swiss hoteliers Aman have been mooted as the operators of the resort. 

Rooms at its properties in the French Alps and Venice fetch about $1,000 a night — the median monthly salary in Albania.

Backing the secluded five-star retreat is Jared Kushner and his wife Ivanka Trump, the daughter of the US president.

Mr Kushner is closely intertwined with his father-in-law's administration and has been a key shadow mediator in peace talks in the Middle East and Ukraine — but is not a government employee.

This technicality has allowed him to continue running his highly profitable private equity firm, Affinity Partners, where, with the backing of Saudi sovereign wealth, he pours billions of dollars into Israeli tech and European real estate.

Investment in Albania's coast has been a key driver of the nation's economy since the communist regime fell in 1990. And successive governments have been eager to bring in foreign cash to build up its scenic coastline.

Mr Trajce, who despite being the executive director of Protection and Preservation of Natural Environment in Albania and one of the country's leading environmentalists, was blindsided by the project.

"We were never consulted. We were never approached," he said.

"And to our knowledge, nobody — no other serious or reputable organisation or research group that deals with the environment — has been approached."

Kept completely in the dark, Mr Trajce has been forced to piece together the resort's massive scale through incremental media leaks. 

What he sees terrifies him.

"Eight stories high, resorts, with apartments, with villas — it feels very much like a real estate development project rather than a tourism development project," he said.

"It would be the complete destruction of the ecosystem here. 

"We are talking about the most fragile part of this protected area.

"The consequences can be as unpredictable and as catastrophic that it's very hard to imagine any other scenario than a complete alteration of the ecosystem."

A dodgy Trump story?

The provenance of the idea for the resort is the subject of heated debate, but according to Ivanka Trump, she and her husband dreamt up the idea while on a glamorous summer sojourn.

In May, speaking on the David Senrapodcast, Ms Trump — who works in the family real estate business — recalled the dreamy discovery.

"[Jared and I] were on a friend's boat, and we stopped for a swim," she said.

"Effectively, that's how we found it. We swam to the islands."

The friend was millionaire British financier and earl, Nathaniel Rothschild, and the boat was the baron's 73-metre superyacht Planet 9, which hosted the pair in 2021.

She went on to tell the podcast's host that Sazan was "an unbelievable, beautiful 1,400-hectare private island in the middle of the Mediterranean".

She then claimed she and Mr Kushner climbed across the craggy terrain of the island to reach its peak.

Ms Trump's account has been widely derided in Albania, with critics questioning the veracity of the anecdote.

"When Ivanka said she walked around the island barefoot, I was quite surprised, because the terrain is quite rough," Mr Trajce told 7.30.

"Even for us as experienced field workers, it's very hard to walk that terrain with proper hiking boots.

"To me it was clear she didn't have a proper connection to the place. 

"Yes, the island is beautiful but it's beautiful because it's wild."

Ms Trump's claim that the island is private and was "found" by her and Mr Kushner is dubious.

The island is public land and was home to a military base for decades.

It has also been a major tourist destination since the beach was opened to the public in 2015.

When 7.30 visited the island, it was clear it was no secret.

Loud music blasted from rented powerboats moored at the shore and hordes of tourists were arriving on passenger ferries — with guides taking them to a small swimming beach.

One group of holiday-makers was eating a catered lunch as their large water taxi completed a leisurely lap of the island.

It's not just the credibility of Ivanka Trump's story that has angered many Albanians — it's the way in which her husband's firm has been given the green light to build on one of the last protected parts of the Mediterranean.

Laws for oligarchs and the underworld

In February 2024, the Albanian government led by Prime Minister Edi Rama passed sweeping changes to laws protecting the environment and Albania's protected beaches and parks.

The new legislation allowed Mr Rama's administration to permit (at their discretion) five-star resorts to be built in areas that were previously off-limits.

The laws were passed just three days after the initial plans for the resort were quietly made public by the Kushner team.

It's also since been reported that Mr Rama met Ms Trump and her husband on that 2021 boat trip.

The government has denied tailoring the laws for the American couple but Albanians are suspicious of the statutory changes.

Redi Muçi, an academic who left his job at Albania's top university to become a representative in the Albanian parliament, told 7.30 that corruption is endemic in Albania, where valuable land sales are often subject to shady deals.

Mr Muçi is particularly alarmed by the government-linked committee headed by Mr Rama that gives him personal oversight of land deals.

He says it is concerning that land often ends up in the hands of figures accused of being connected to the Albanian underworld.

"The Special Investigation Unit issued more than 20 arrest warrants for people related to drug trafficking who have acquired more than a million square metres of construction permits," Mr Muçi told 7.30, in Tirana.

"It's not a problem of the Trump family developing in Albania itself. It's more to do with the corruption that's behind it."

In the case of the Trump-Kushner development there are serious questions surrounding the ownership of the glittering coastline.

The development company backed by Mr Kushner reportedly acquired a portion of the development rights from Arthur Shehu, a Miami-based Albanian businessman.

Mr Shehu is wanted by authorities in Tirana over allegations of drug smuggling and money laundering.

Albania's anti-corruption watchdog is now alleging that Mr Shehu forged the property deeds to the land before selling it for development.

There is no allegation that Mr Kushner, Ms Trump or Affinity Partners committed any wrongdoing.

Mr Kushner and Affinity did not respond to the ABC's request for comment.

Villagers in the area are also claiming ancestral ownership of the land, with a case currently before the courts.

Mr Muçi fears the case will languish in the judicial system for years and said precedent suggests locals are often overpowered by large corporations and powerful Albanians when land is contested.

"What happens to the local residents is that they carry on a long legal fight that spreads for decades, but that never concludes with them receiving what they're due," he said.

The Albanian government has been contacted for comment — but Prime Minister Edi Rama has previously dismissed suggestions the development will have a highly adverse effect on the coastline's environment.

Enter the revolution

The government says that its law changes and liberal approach to granting development permits are in the name of tourism and economic development.

In 1990, when Communism fell in Albania, the country was destitute.

Gradually, conditions improved as governments used tourism to bring in cash.

Under Mr Rama, the tourism boom has accelerated, with buildings along the Mediterranean springing up regularly.

Vlore, the bustling beachside city next to the earmarked Trump-Kushner site in Zvërnec, is packed with hotels, restaurants, and tourism infrastructure, including a controversial airport, which is currently under construction.

Over summer, the beaches are packed as Albania's modest population of 2.6 million people swells to about 11 million.

"Of course we need to have tourism," Mr Muçi told 7.30.

"We need to benefit from the fact that Albania has its mountains, its coastline, good weather. But alongside that, this cannot be the sole economic input in the Albanian economy."

For years Albanians have watched concrete take over their once-untouched beaches with mounting sadness.

Resistance was small in scale.

But that small activist movement was just the prologue to a historic wave of public fury.

'They want to take our nature'

On a Friday night in Tirana hundreds of people gather in the main square, under the rich orange glow of the evening sun.

Skanderbeg Square is the main stage for the protest.

When 7.30 attended, it was the 41st protest against Albanian development and the Trump-Kushner resort.

Twenty-five-year-old Sona Faudi and her friend, 23-year-old Najada Dafa, went to the square as soon as they finished work.

They attend every day from 7pm.

"We need to protect our land. Ivanka Trump wants to buy Sazan Island, but we don't want our land to be treated like private land," Ms Faudi told 7.30.

"They want to take our nature from us.

"Albanians won't profit anything from this because it is being built for rich people, and we have other things we need to be concerned about."

The protests began in May when footage surfaced of security personnel restraining a demonstrator at the Trump-Kushner development site.

Widespread public outrage triggered massive protests across Albania, mobilising hundreds of thousands of citizens.

Known as 'The Flamingo Revolution' it is now widely considered the largest anti-government display in the country since Communism fell.

Ms Dafa, who works as a scientific researcher, said Ms Trump's comments about "finding" the island were also a flashpoint for many Albanians.

"She made it sound like she was Christopher Columbus," she told 7.30.

"It's isolated, of course, but we know it exists — we have been there."

The night 7.30 joined Ms Faudi and Ms Dafa, organisers said about 3,000 people descended on central Tirana to protest.

"We will never stop protesting because we are Albanians, we are Balkans, and Balkans are very stubborn people," Ms Faudi said.

The demonstrators hope global attention can heap pressure on the Albanian government, and that the EU (of which Albania aims to be a member by 2030) can step in to halt the resort.

But not everyone disapproves of the tourism money rushing into the country's economy.

Some Albanians are relishing the country's willingness to open itself up to the world.

"We were in Communism for 50 years and completely isolated in a country. You cannot imagine how happy we are when we see people from every place of the world," one local told us.

"I think the development has been done in a very nice way. If you go to Spain, you see a similar thing. If you go to Miami, you see a similar thing. Why not in Albania?" he said.

Those within Albania's hospitality industry, including hotelier Kujtim Dervishi, say tourism has been a boon for business.

"The media in Albania and internationally are making too much of a negative issue of Albania's seaside," Mr Derivishi told 7.30.

"The coast is beautiful and great for tourism ... they've been investing in it and that's a good thing, it's strategic."

There is still no timeline on when Mr Kushner and Ms Trump's island dream will become a reality.

But surveyors have been spotted on the beach and a service road has already been constructed.

And while the government has granted the couple preliminary approval, court cases, protests, and concerns from the EU could delay the project for several years.

Activists say the Flamingo Revolution will roll on for as long as it takes.

Credits:

Reporter: Elias Clure

Photography and drone videography: Che Chorley

Digital production: Myles Wearring and Jenny Ky

Editor: Paul Johnson

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