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Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama said Friday there is “no reason to worry” about a planned luxury tourism complex linked to U.S. President Donald Trump’s family, as protests grow against the project.
The project is led by Trump’s daughter Ivanka Trump and her husband, Jared Kushner, and has drawn criticism from protesters who say it could damage the environment in the protected Vjosa-Narta area on Albania’s southern Adriatic coast.
Rama made the remarks in Montenegro, where he was attending a European Union summit with Balkan leaders.
Rama said no project has yet been approved and that discussions should come only after a formal plan exists.
“There is no yet project approved... First, we need to have the project, then to see the project, then to discuss the project,” Rama told reporters.
“We cannot discuss something that does not exist,” he said.
Rama also called on Western media to be “much more careful” in their reporting on the issue.
“There is no reason to worry as far as there is no project,” he added.
However, Rama said “top” world experts were involved in the plan and said the goal was “to make something unique.”
Protests have grown in Albania for nearly a week against the proposed luxury resort project.
The estimated $1.2 billion plan includes luxury hotels in the protected Vjosa-Narta area.
Developers also hope to transform the uninhabited island of Sazan, once a secret communist military base, into a high-end tourist destination.
The project was first unveiled more than two years ago, but many details remain unclear.
Uncertainty remains over issues including property titles for land where some hotels would be built.
No buildings have been constructed so far.
The project has appeared in images posted on Kushner’s Instagram account, visits by Ivanka Trump to Albania with investors earlier this year and her recent podcast comments praising the area.
In recent days, videos showing preparatory work on the coast and bulldozers on the beach went viral, intensifying opposition to the plan.
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