How to Extract Millions from the Albanian State through Endless Litigation
“I have fought against the political persecution of at least one government. I won.” Next to these words on a large billboard in the center of Rome, a black-and-white photo of man crossing his arms, looking defiantly into the camera. This is Francesco Becchetti, Italian entrepreneur.
Becchetti’s adventure in Albania started, like most fine things in life, with a concession for a hydroelectric plant on the Vjosa river at Kalivaç, originally granted in May 1997 during the tenure of Government of National Reconciliation under Prime Minister Bashkim Fino, right in the middle of Albania’s quasi-civil war, a curious timing to invest hundreds of millions of euros. He applied for another concession for a waste management facility in Tirana in 2004, during the government of former Prime Minister Fatos Nano, following in the footsteps of his uncle Manlio Cerroni, “king of the Roman landfills.” In April 2013, Becchetti started broadcasting via Agon Channel, a TV channel which after the elections that year became popular for its views critical of the newly elected government of Prime Minister Edi Rama.
When Rama, the former Mayor of Tirana, allegedly continued his obstruction the implementation of the waste management facility concession, Becchetti put the Albanian government on notice for violations of the investment treaty between Italy and Albania. The Rama government retaliated by starting criminal investigations into Becchetti’s hydroelectric plant and fledgling media operation.
In June 2015, the Albanian government issued international arrest warrents for Becchetti c.s. for money laundering, tax evasion, and falsification of documents. All his possessions were confiscated and his government-critical TV station, Agon Channel, was closed down. Many journalists and activists saw this as a direct attack on media freedom, but Prime Minister Rama quipped triumphantly on social media, “The blocking of the source of black money that fed Agon Channel has been a success!”
In the same month, Becchetti and his business partners brought the cancellation of the hydropower concession and closure of Agon Channel before the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) of the World Bank on the basis of the bilateral investment treaty between Albania and Italy, demanding a suspension of the criminal proceedings, cancellation of the asset confiscation, and withdrawal of the international arrest warrants.
In November 2015, Becchetti was arrested in London. The Albanian government sought his extradition. In March 2016, the ICSID ruled that both the criminal investigation and arrest warrants against Becchetti c.s. be suspended pending arbitration at the court. Based, in part, on this ICSID ruling, the Westminster Magistrates Court in England ruled in July 2016 against Becchetti’s extradition, calling the Albanian government’s evidence “wrong and misleading.”
On April 24, 2019, the ICSID issued its verdict in the case of Becchetti c.s. against the Albanian government. The court found that Agonset, the mother company of Agon Channel, had been expropriated by the Albanian government, despite the government’s claim that it had simply followed Albanian law. “A state cannot escape liability for measures that breach international law solely on the basis that those measures conform with domestic law,” the verdict stated.
The court was also sympathetic to Becchetti’s claim that the closure of TV channel was politically motivated, considering Rama’s personal campaign against Becchetti and the former’s proximity to Agon Channel’s main competitors. Besides the millions of euros that the Albanian state had already spent on legal and administrative costs, the ICSID awarded damages to Becchetti c.s. totaling nearly €100 million, nearly €10 million in legal fees and arbitration costs, to be compounded with interest as long as the damages weren’t paid.
Becchetti put up his billboard. Rama insisted he’d pay “zero.”
In November 2023, Albania signed the so-called “Migration Protocol” with the Italian government. This international agreement envisioned the construction of two migrant detention camps built on Albanian territory, used by the Italian government to process asylum seekers. The Protocol further determined that the costs for the construction and management of these camps would be fully covered by the Italian government, whereas the Albanian government was to be reimbursed by the Italian side for specific costs, such as healthcare and policing. Italy commited to an initial downpayment of €16.5 million.
On the Italian side, the 5-year Protocol is implemented via Senate Act no. 995, which contains, among others, the details concerning the financing of the detention camps on Albanian soil. Art. 3(8) contains the following curious provision:
The credits of the Republic of Albania towards the Italian State, deriving from the implementation of the Protocol, cannot be seized by third parties. Any notified deeds of seizure or foreclosure are null and void. […] (my emphases)
A recent emission of the Italian Rai3 investigative program “Report” shines some further light on the Protocol. Apart from possible relations between Rama’s consigliere Engjëll Agaçi and Albanian drug lords, “Report” uncovered that the funds budgeted for reimbursement to Albania amounted to €25 million for 2024 and €16.5 million for each subsequent year, plus an additional emergency fund of €3 million, all adding up to about €100 million. The existence of these two funds of Albanian “credits” provides the reason why art. 3(8) – of questionable legality – was inserted into Italian Senate Act no. 995.
“A state cannot escape liability for measures that breach international law solely on the basis that those measures conform with domestic law.” – International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes Case No. ARB/15/28, April 24, 2019.
The program also features Becchetti, who since the 2019 ICSID verdict has followed a course along European courts to lay claim to Albanian state assets, as the Rama government continues to refuse to abide by the binding verdict.1 In the same spirit, Becchetti has reportedly filed a claim at the Court of Rome to seize the funds destined to reimburse Albania under the Protocol. Asked about art. 3(8), Becchetti responds:
Paradoxically, I am the one who is called upon to finance the migrant center for my persecutor Edi Rama. […] [Art. 3(8)] is an ad personam rule toward me. It is in violation of the [European] Convention on Human Rights and it is in violation of the ICSID Convention. […] That provision is unconstitutional, ad personam, and void.
And so the retaliatory closure of Agon Channel continues to haunt Prime Minister Rama. Whereas initially he had tried to sell his attack on media freedom in Albania as a sure sign of the New Justice to come, of an end to criminal impunity, the ICSID’s final verdict and Becchetti’s continuous litigation to obtain his damages may now very well complicate his attempts to ingratiate himself with European fascists in his attempts to turn Albania into the extraterritorial clearing house of EU immigration.
His responses to queries by Giorgio Mottola, the journalist of “Report,” on the sidelines of the 2024 EU–Western Balkans Summit in Tirana not only show his general disdain for the media, but also his profound unease with the entire Becchetti case:
Mottola: But that's what you ask of Italy: 100 million euros [the amount in the two Italian funds destined for Albania].
Rama: No.
Mottola: Francesco Becchetti asked to seize that amount. Becchetti, Italian entrepreneur, Agon Channel.
Rama: Who's this? I don’t know him.
Mottola: Well, you were sentenced to pay 130 million euros to Becchetti [the approximate total damages plus interest since 2019].
Rama: I don't think so.
Mottola: You don’t think so? He has sought seizure [of the Italian funds].
Rama: I don’t know him.
Rather than dealing with the questions of the Italian journalist, Prime Minister Rama decided to complain directly to the director of Rai, in the hope of nipping more extensive Italian media coverage of the dark sides of the Protocol in the bud.
But when it comes to the verdict of the ICSID, there is no director, no higher court that Rama can talk to. There is no boss he can persuade to chastise a puny underling. The most he can do is continue to battle Becchetti in multiple European courts (or have other governments do so on his behalf), while sitting out his current and future terms. Yet it is a certainty that Becchetti’s accountants and lawyers will outlive any Rama government, and when that moment comes, the bill, with years, if not decades, of accrued interest, will still be due. It will be, once again, the Albanian people that ultimately pay the price of Rama’s disdain for reality.
The Albanian Mechanism is part of Manifesto GREAT WAVE.