TIRANA, July 11 - Albania’s specialised anti-corruption agency has prepared case files asserting that deeds to the coastal land sold for a planned multi-billion-dollar resort linked to Jared Kushner may have been falsified, and that the seller used proceeds from narcotics trafficking to acquire property, according to documents reviewed by Reuters.
The businessman at the centre of the files, Artur Shehu, who lives in Miami, has been the subject of an Albanian arrest warrant alleging money laundering connected to drug gangs, his lawyer Kujtim Cakrani said. Cakrani strongly rejected the charges and said Shehu denies any wrongdoing.
SPAK - the Special Structure Against Corruption and Organised Crime, the independent body established in 2019 to investigate and prosecute corruption and organised crime - prepared a 200-page file dated June 12, 2026, that alleges Shehu and associates trafficked cocaine from South America into European ports and then laundered the proceeds by purchasing property, sometimes using forged ownership documents.
Allegations and denials
The SPAK files state: "Reasonable suspicions are formed, based on evidence, that the above‑mentioned assets were acquired through the use of forged documents." They assert that properties were purchased with "illegally obtained funds" and that ownership documents were falsified by creating false property titles or by artificially increasing the size of properties, before transferring or exchanging them to make tracing more difficult.
Cakrani told Reuters: "Nothing that has been alleged regarding Mr. Artur Shehu’s character is true. He is neither a drug trafficker nor a forger of property documents." He added: "Mr Shehu is aware of the allegations made by the Albanian prosecution. These allegations do not concern him because he maintains that the truth is entirely different from what the prosecution claims."
The files, which have not been made public, also record a directive to freeze roughly 110 million paid for the land in a notary account, preventing the funds from being released to Shehu.
Connection to the Kushner-backed resort
In April, Shehu sold a strip of coastal land to Albania Land Development, a company owned by Sazan Real Estate Development and other investors involved in a resort project in which Jared Kushner is confirmed as an investor. The SPAK documents do not allege any wrongdoing by Kushner, Sazan Real Estate Development, Albania Land Development or other project investors, and Reuters found no indication that investors were aware of SPAKs suspicions when they purchased the land.
A spokesperson for Sazan Real Estate Development declined to address the specific allegations against Shehu but said the company believes the land acquisitions were legitimate and that it will cooperate with any lawful processes. Albania Land Development did not respond to requests for comment. A spokesperson for Kushner declined to comment.
Legal and community disputes over ownership
The resort project has already been controversial locally. Residents of the village of Zvernec have long disputed Shehus ownership claims in court for more than a decade. Last month, a group of villagers presented title deeds and tax records to Reuters that they said demonstrated their ownership of the disputed parcels. Their lawyer, Kostandin Beko, said the case remains open and that they plan to request a court injunction to halt the resort.
SPAKs files identify Shehu by name, and the arrest warrants issued by the agency on June 12, 2026 publicly named 20 individuals as suspects for narcotics trafficking and laundering; those arrest warrants used initials in line with Albanian practice, but the initials correspond to full names in the case files, including a suspect listed as "A.Sh."
Cakrani, acknowledging his client had been named as a target, said he was not worried about the arrest warrant and suggested that Albanian prosecutors operate under political or business influence, a claim he characterized as "widely believed." The SPAK spokesperson confirmed the agency was investigating but declined further comment. SPAK has not indicated whether any of the 20 suspects have been arrested or formally charged since the warrants were announced.
Broader context: environment, investment and politics
The planned Kushner-backed development lies along a stretch of largely undeveloped coastline featuring beaches, forests and wetlands that are habitat for sea turtles and flamingoes. Environmental and community opposition has been vocal; protesters have framed their campaign as the "Flamingo Revolution." Opponents say the project threatens wildlife and fragile ecosystems.
Ivanka Trump has said she and Jared Kushner conceived the idea for the resort after seeing the coastline from a yacht years earlier. Kushner posted an artist's rendering in 2024 depicting hotels, villas, pools and yacht jetties across the land. The exact nature and scale of Kushners financial commitment to the project have not been disclosed publicly.
Albania, which is seeking to join the EU, has been undergoing a construction surge along some of its Adriatic coastline. Prime Minister Edi Rama told Reuters last month that the project is "a beautiful" undertaking and said it would proceed. The government has strongly backed the plans and framed protests as politically motivated by opponents.
A government spokesperson said the state would not intervene in private transactions and maintained that the project was proceeding in compliance with Albanian and EU laws. Brussels has previously urged Albania, as an EU candidate, to respect EU environmental rules in relation to the development. An EU Commission spokesperson did not provide additional comment for this article.
Investors' stance and unanswered questions
Sazan Real Estate Development reiterated: "We continue to believe the underlying land acquisitions were conducted lawfully and in accordance with applicable procedures. As always, we respect and will cooperate with any lawful process as required." When asked to explain why the company insists the purchases were lawful despite the prosecutors allegations against Shehu, the company's spokesperson did not provide further detail.
SPAKs account alleges the land was sold for around 110 million and that those funds were ordered frozen in a notary account. The agency says the funds were derived from the proceeds of trafficking South American cocaine into European ports and then laundered via property acquisitions.
Shehus lawyer told Reuters that Shehus family had owned the land since the Ottoman era more than 100 years ago and that the sale to the resort investors was lawful. Cakrani also described a personal history in which Shehu sought political asylum in the United States in 1998 after members of "criminal gangs" allegedly killed his brother and uncle in front of him. Reuters said it could not verify that account independently.
Legal process and next steps
The SPAK files and the public arrest warrants mark the latest escalation in a case that interweaves criminal allegations, property disputes and a high-profile foreign investment. SPAKs preparation of detailed files and the freezing order indicate prosecutors are treating the allegations as serious, but the substance of the case, the evidence, and any potential charges or prosecutions remain confined to the agency's internal documents and the standard legal processes that follow such investigations.
Neither the U.S. Justice Department nor U.S. authorities have publicly confirmed whether they have received an Albanian request to locate or detain Shehu in Miami. A U.S. Justice Department spokesperson declined to comment on whether it had received such a request.
What remains uncertain
Whether any of the 20 people named by SPAK have since been arrested or charged remains unclear from official statements.
The extent and nature of Kushners financial investment in the resort have not been made public, and SPAK did not allege wrongdoing by Kushner or the projects developers.
Local ownership claims by Zvernec villagers, which are the subject of long-running court disputes, remain unresolved and continue to pose potential legal challenges to the development.
The intersection of alleged cross-border narcotics trafficking, accused money-laundering through property, ongoing local land disputes, and a politically sensitive international investment has created a complex legal and reputational environment for the resort project and its backers. How prosecutors, the courts, investors and local stakeholders respond in the coming months will determine whether the project proceeds unimpeded or faces legal delays and additional scrutiny.