Peter Lucas: Why Trump confused Armenia with Albania, the country that is losing the war on corruption

by Peter Lucas/ Boston Herald

It is understandable why President Donald Trump would have Albania on his mind.

That is because his daughter Ivanka and son-in-law Jared Kushner are on the verge of scoring big with a billion-dollar exclusive luxury condo development on Sazan Island just off the Albanian coast.

Trump confused Albania with Armenia when he mistakenly claimed in a Mark Levin interview last week that he had brokered a peace agreement between Azerbaijan and Albania, when he meant to say Azerbaijan and Armenia.

Armenia is a landlocked nation in the South Caucasus region of Eurasia, bordering Turkey.  Albania, a former socialist country, is located in the Balkans, bordering Greece, and has a long coastline along the Adriatic Sea, facing Italy.

Trump, in talking about his worldwide peacemaking successes, said, “You saw Azerbaijan. That was a big one going on for thirty-five years with, uh, Albania. Think of that.”

“I mean, going on for years, and I got to know the heads, and I got to know them through trade. I was dealing with them a little bit, and I said, ’Why are you guys fighting? Then I said, ‘I’m not gonna do a trade deal if you guys are gonna fight. It’s crazy,’” Trump said.

The “two guys” were Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan. It is understandable if Trump did not dare risk remembering, mentioning, and botching their names.

But he would have remembered the name of Albanian Socialist Prime Minister Edi Rama, whom Ivanka and Jared Kushner have befriended, and who paved the way for the Kushner/Trump investment.

It is a tricky investment of more than $1.4 billion. While Albania has never been at war with Azerbaijan, it has been at war with internal political corruption, which it is losing.

While fast buck tourism is flourishing along the coast, Tirana, the capital, has become a paradise for money laundering.

A former president of Albania, Ilir Meta, is in prison on corruption charges, former Prime Minister Sali Berisha is on trial for political corruption, and Erion Veliaj, the mayor of Tirana and heir apparent to Rama, is in jail awaiting trial on money laundering charges.

Only two years ago, Charles McGonigal, a former top FBI counterintelligence official, was sentenced to more than two years in prison for concealing some $225,000 in laundered cash he received from a former Albanian intelligence official who once worked for Rama.

McGonigal allegedly warned Rama against awarding a lucrative oil drilling contract to a Russian front company in which the intelligence officer had a financial interest. In appreciation, McGonigal presented Rama with an FBI hat.

There is no evidence that Ivanka and Jared Kushner gave Rama anything during their meetings, other than good wishes from Trump, which may have been enough to win Rama’s approval of the project.

Rama, who once called Trump an embarrassment, now praises him, saying, upon Trump’s return to the White House, “Maybe God saved Donald Trump not only to make America great, but to wake up Europe.”

 Kushner, along with Saudi Arabian partners, plans to build a series of luxury condos on Sazan Island, an uninhabited island in the Bay of Vlora that overlooks the Adriatic and Ionian Seas. The views are spectacular.

The island, which the locals now call “Trump Island,” was off limits to the public for years. It once served as an Italian military outpost during World War II. It was later occupied by the Russians during the Cold War.  There are crumbling military installations all over the island, as well as old military ordnance lying around.

The project was enhanced by the completion of a new airport just miles away at Vlora. This means that the rich can fly in and out to their exclusive island in Albania without meeting any Albanians, other than the cleaning lady. It's Albanian socialism.

If things don’t work out, they can always turn the island into Albania's Alcatraz. Trump would like that too.

Veteran political reporter Peter Lucas, author of three books on Albania,  can be reached at: [email protected]