Albania Freezes Assets in Kushner Resort Probe

A widening property-fraud investigation into a $4 billion luxury resort linked to Jared Kushner has led Albanian authorities to freeze developer assets, compounding pressure from public protests and international critics.

Reported by
Lindita Cela Shteg
June 2, 2026

Albanian anti-corruption prosecutors on Tuesday froze the bank accounts of a landholding company tied to a controversial $4 billion luxury resort project backed by Jared Kushner, President Donald Trump’s son-in-law. The escalating crisis over the coastal development has triggered mass protests, a sharp diplomatic rift with neighboring Greece, and stern warnings from the European Union.

The preventive seizure, ordered by the Special Prosecution Against Corruption and Organized Crime, targeted Albania Land Development amid a widening investigation into allegedly fraudulent property titles. The company, owned by the prominent Qatari entrepreneurs Moutaz and Ramez Al-Khayyat, recently purchased beachfront plots in Zvërnec. The protected coastal area along the Adriatic Sea, near the southern city of Vlora, is where Kushner’s investment firm, Affinity Partners, plans to build an elite mega-resort.

The legal intervention follows days of intense public unrest. Over the weekend, thousands of demonstrators marched through the capital, Tirana, under the banner “Albania Is Not for Sale.” Environmental groups and local residents are protesting the development’s encroachment on the Pishë-Poro-Nartë protected area, a sensitive Mediterranean wetland critical for flamingos and nesting sea turtles.

Public outrage boiled over after recent clashes between local residents and private guards hired to secure the construction site. Viral footage from the site showed a guard punching and dragging a protester away from the fenced-off beach.
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