Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama (R) and EU Enlargement Commissioner Marta Kos at the EU summit in Tirana, November 2025. Photo: EPA/MALTON DIBRA.
During a joint conference with European Commissioner for Enlargement Marta Kos in Brussels on Tuesday, Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama promised to change the country’s disputed Law on Protected Areas to align with EU standards – a declaration that protesters at home hailed as a “moral victory”.
During the press conference, Kos was asked whether Albania’s ongoing environmental protests, nicknamed the “Flamingo Revolution”, would affect its EU integration.
“Even before these protests began, we had agreed with Albania that the 2024 amendments to the Law on Protected Areas would be repealed this year, also repeal of the Law on Strategic Investments,” Kos said, referring to changes made to laws to allow luxury tourist constructions in protected areas.
Rama then said the strategic investments law would be repealed and the protected areas law changed according to EU standards. “We need to repeal the law on strategic investments, something we agreed upon some time ago, because that law has fulfilled its mission,” Rama said.
“As for the other law, there is nothing to repeal, even though a European Parliament resolution called for it, but we must address the legislation in accordance with all European standards and amend any provisions within it that do not align with those standards,” he added.
Albanians have been protesting for 45 days, at first in opposition to a luxury resort planed in a protected area of the Vjosa-Narta lagoon with links to Jared Kushner, US President Donald Trump’s son-in-law. They accuse Rama’s government of corruption.
Ervin Goci, a professor in Tirana and a protester, welcomed a “moral victory for the cause.”
“This is one of the greatest victories of the ‘Flamingo Revolution’, which compelled the Commissioner for Enlargement to condition Albania’s progress in the integration process on repeal of the Law on Protected Areas,” Goci wrote on Facebook on Wednesday, referencing rare birds threatened by planned developments.
“Don’t forget that two months ago in Narta, the most popular ‘animal’ was the bulldozer,” Goci said, adding that the real victory would be when all protected areas are saved and Rama resigns.
On June 17, The European Parliament expressed “deep regret” over two Albanian laws MEPs said put the interests of luxury tourism developers ahead of protected natural areas.
The extension of the 2015 Law on Strategic Investments enables “accelerated permitting procedures and reduced environmental scrutiny, which risk adversely affecting protected areas and other environmentally sensitive zones”, the European Parliament said.
It also called for the repeal of the 2024 amendments to the Law on Protected Area, which it said “allow the development of large-scale tourism infrastructure within protected areas” and weaken environmental oversight.
The two laws are key to the planned luxury development in the Vjosa-Narta lagoon area on the coast headed by Kushner.
