The chargé d'affaires of the United States Embassy, Nancy Van Horn, has visited the Delvina gas field, a business that was hit hard by the government last year, leading to arrests based on evidence that turned out to be fabricated in court.
During this visit, Ms. Van Horn was also greeted by the Dutch ambassador to Tirana, Reinout Vos. The news was made public by the United States embassy itself, which accompanied the photos of the visit with a very strong message to the government.
"President Trump is driving a new era of increased American energy production, with American investments strengthening global energy security. Stressing the importance of a transparent regulatory environment for attracting international investment, Chargé d'Affaires Nancy VanHorn and Dutch Ambassador Reinout Vos visited the Delvina Gas Field last week to explore opportunities in Albania's energy sector," the US embassy said in a post.
The government crackdown
The Delvina gas field is exploited under concession by the Delvina Gas Company. This company was owned by Albanian businessman Sokol Meqemeja. But last summer, state police surrounded the company's premises, arresting several engineers and putting the company's owner and administrator on the wanted list.
Sokol Meqemeja
According to the government, the company had built an illegal power plant on the concession premises, but the company denied this accusation, stating that the facility was a gas purification plant. The police arrests were only cleared a few days later, when the prosecution dropped the charges against the company.
According to some well-informed sources, the reason for the sudden attack on Delvina Gas had vested interests. At that time, Edi Rama spoke of a plan that saw the creation of a mixed monopoly in the energy sector. A scheme, which according to some sources would revolve around an Israeli businessman, a personal friend of Edi Rama.
The crackdown on Delvina Gas, which was led on the ground by former Deputy Prime Minister Belinda Balluku, forced businessman Meqemeja to sell the company to an American-Dutch consortium.
Therefore, the visit of Chargé d'Affaires Van Horn and Dutch Ambassador Vos to the Delvina source site seems like a red line for the Albanian government, now that a new sheriff has arrived in town.
Editorial
