Court Decides to Protect Valbona National Park

A three-judge panel at the Administrative Court of Appeals in Tirana, Albania, on June 6, 2018, decided to immediately ban all works on three hydropower plants being built by Dragobia Energy in the Valbona Valley National Park.

This decision should remain in force until the final settlement of the indictment filed by the nongovernmental TOKA and 27 local residents, with support from the WWF, against Albania's National Territorial Council (KKT), and which could last several months or years depending on the complaint process.

The announcement states that the Appeals Court's decision came after the court's earlier decision to allow the continuation of work against the court case.

“The order for the ban was initially requested in January 2018, as part of an indictment against Albania's KKT on their decision in November 2017 to issue the project a new construction permit. The plaintiffs argued that the new leave was clearly illegal, since the Defence Areas Law had been amended in June 2017, where the new law declared all HEC construction in National Parks illegal. Initial permission to build projects expired in May 2017. Under Albanian law, a ban warrant should be issued in all cases when irreversible environmental damage could occur during the period of judicial process;”, said a statement.

This decision sets an important precedent in Albania for high risk cases of environmental damage and shows that environmental protection is moving slowly towards key agendas.

The international nongovernmental organization for conservation has been present in the Valley of Valbonne since 2016, supporting the local community in their struggle for a clean and healthy environment from which to be able to maintain their well-being.

This support also includes financial and expert support for local NGO Earth and 27 residents in their legal fight. They have filed indictments at the administrative court against the Ministry of Energy and Infrastructure in May 2017 (currently awaiting complaints) and against the National Territorial Council in November 2017.

There is no clarity of how many other HECs are scheduled to be built on the Valbona River. Based on public information documents, concessions have been issued for another 11 HECs.

Environmental permits for building these three HECs are based on a very weak assessment of impact on the environment, and you have also reached your deadline in 2015. All the concession processes have been very non-transparent, and have shown non-concilativeness to the welfare of the local population. And they have failed to highlight in environmental impact assessment that they are being built in a protected area of Catagoria I I IUCN. The non-transparent process for public consultations is directly in the face of the Aarhus Convention, the convention that regulates access to information, public participation in the decision making and access to Justice for Environmental Affairs, and Albania has been among the first signatory states of this convention in 2001.