Rama's full letter to “Fiential Times”: Cannabis has ruined Albanian life

Prime Minister Edi Rama in a writing about prestige “Financial Times” writes that the fight against drugs and crime remains a European problem and not only of Albania.

Full letter:

I'm aware that if you mention Albania, some people immediately think about drugs and crime. I'm also aware that erasing such an image, which is deeply unjust to a country with a largely peaceful population and respecting the law, takes time, above all, action.

Last week we learned that our action is reaping fruit. We owe Italian financial police, Guardia di Finanza, and the sophisticated surveillance it conducts from the air to uncover cannabis parcels for Albanian police forces. Statistics leave no room for doubt. A year ago, they identified 2, 086 surfaces planted throughout Albania on their flights. This year, even after extended monitoring flights, their number was only 88. Now, they've all been destroyed by our police. This is real progress. Tagged for years as the European capital of cannabis, Albania had its cup filled, and we began to react.

For a quarter of a century, cannabis has destroyed the lives of Albanians, corrupted local officials has poisoned national politics, while enriching bandits. Last year at this time, international media died from titles for record areas planted by cannabis in Albania. Perhaps because journalists withdraw from half the cup, more than enough, true history never succeeded in seeing the light of publication. The real story was that record areas of cannabis were finally being identified and destroyed.

This is not the end of history at all. Those who were enriched by drug cultivation must pay for their crimes. We've started the second phase of the special operation against them and their assets. We're cleaning up the judicial system, properly verifying the figure of judges, who have long been run by criminals and their money. However, these criminals do not operate only in Albania. They are linked and related to organised crime in cannabis consumption countries, and the governments of these countries should also bear part of the responsibility to bring them to justice.

We in Albania have done everything we could to root out a considerable source of the problem last year, but consumption countries should investigate with all energy criminals and freeze the income that comes from their crimes. In the coming weeks and months, we will share what we know and the evidence we have against them with police forces and financial regulators across Europe. They're dangerous people. My government considers them a threat to national security. So should your governments. Perhaps many of them live elsewhere in Europe claiming to be legitimate merchants, but don't make mistakes, they are criminals whose international businesses enslave people everywhere.

They won't think twice about using their wealth to buy influence. They will receive seemingly respected legal studios and accounting and lobby agencies. Through these mediators, they will find ways to turn these charges against themselves, presenting themselves as innocent victims of attacks coming from rivals in business or worse, from political opponents specifically, from me and my government. We've already seen it happen. Reform of our justice system and re-evaluating judges and prosecutors for corruption and inadequacy the key conditions imposed by the European Union before entering formal membership negotiations almost deviated earlier this year. Selfish interest in reform brought unrest to the streets and, at times, seemed determined to put our new democracy at risk.

It is noteworthy that for 20 years the drug barons were able to keep the area around the Albanian village of Lazarati safe haven of cannabis production and processing, a no-pass zone for police and other government authorities. So great was the power of the drug trade that a predecessor of my prime minister acknowledged that failure to intervene in the area was a “steadfast political decision”. My government overturned this policy in 2014, and a major police operation closed Lazarati. Police destroyed a “product” that represented about a quarter of the cannabis seized throughout Albania during that year. This was the beginning of our fight against the bandits.

We now have to take another important step. On Friday, I sent a letter to leaders of the 28 European Union member states seeking their support in our battle with drug lords. We know that some live and thrive in your country, taking advantage of illicit drugs, prostitution, trafficking in human beings and other illegal activities”, is written in my letter. We ask for your help, in return, we offer ours, to capture these people and to bring them to justice”. I hope that all citizens of EU countries will call on their governments to stand by us. This is a battle for all to win. /Okéu. com/