Tom Doshi

Skënder Gjinushi, (left) and Edi Rama on a conference about the 50th anniversary of the Congress of Language in Tirana on 10 November 2022. Photo: LSA

Few people in the US or abroad took notice of President Joe Biden's memorandum to combat corruption globally -until the Administration began to declare former world leaders personae non grata.

In Albania, the US had repeatedly criticized Prime Minister Edi Rama's Socialist government of corruption, calling it "pervasive in all branches of government," especially in the judiciary.

Former Albanian prime minister Sali Berisha. Photo: LSA

Berisha is the fourth Albanian to be added to the list of people unwelcome in the US after former General Prosecutor Adriatik Llalla, former Socialist Party mayor Vangjush Dako and the current Social Democratic Party head, Tom Doshi.

The US Ambassador to Tirana, Yuri Kim, has put fresh pressure on Albanian parties to vet their lists of candidates submitted to the Central Election Commission, CEC, ahead of the April 25 elections, suggesting some should be disqualified.

The US embassy in Tirana said on Tuesday that it is working on a blacklist of current and former officials in Albania who it considers corrupt and to be working against the interests of the United States.

Albania opposition supporters protesting against Prime Minister Edi Rama in Tirana on June 21 2019. Photo: Gjergj Erebara/BIRN

The attack occurred on Thursday evening when about 200 people assembled at the election centre of the Municipality of Vau i Dejws, an opposition Democratic Party stronghold.

The State Department announced on Monday that businessman and politician Tom Doshi, one of the wealthiest MPs in the Albanian parliament, has been barred from entering the US, along with his immediate family.

The State Department alleged in a statement that Doshi's ban was "due to his involvement in significant corruption".

Albanian police detained Frroku at his home in Tirana after parliament gave the nod to the second request from the General Prosecutor to arrest him, this time in connection with the murder of Albanian citizen in Brussels in 1999.

He is expected to appear in the High Court of Albania within 48 hours.

Albania's police chief has resigned, saying in a letter to Prime Minister Edi Rama and Interior Minister Saimir Tahiri that he felt responsible for the Tirana Interpol office's failure to forward an extradition request from Belgium to the prosecutor's office.

Frroku, who is already under house arrest on different charges, has been convicted by Brussels' first-instance court of the premeditated murder of Albanian citizen Aleksander Kurti in March 1999, in collaboration with three others.