Speaking during a discussion with residents in the coastal village of Zvërnec, Rama said online narratives and subsequent protests were part of what he called a “deliberately engineered” campaign.

“This is something fabricated in a very, very malicious way,” he said, adding that Albania had been targeted for years by hostile cyber activity. He said authorities had built what he described as one of the strongest digital defence systems in Europe and are monitoring online activity linked to the issue.

Rama said there has been an unusual spike in social media activity linked to Albania at the onset of the controversy, which he said indicated coordinated amplification.

He also reiterated claims that Albania is facing a “hybrid war” involving Iran, arguing that disinformation campaigns were aimed at damaging the country’s international reputation.

The government head further alleged that fabricated narratives include claims circulating online that Palestinians would be relocated to Albania under a secret arrangement involving Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and businessman Jared Kushner. He dismissed the claims as false.

Rama said environmental concerns are also being used strategically to mobilise public opinion, citing what he described as international research on the use of climate and environmental issues to generate political instability in EU candidate countries.

A third factor, he said, is economic competition between countries in the region.

“We are now in a space of fierce competition,” Rama said, arguing that rival destinations were attempting to divert investment away from Albania.

He added that previous cases of major investments shifting to neighbouring countries has affected Albania’s tourism sector in the past, and said the Zvërnec project would not be allowed to leave the country.

“This investment will not leave Albania while I am here,” he said.

Rama also said the government has required revisions to the project to better align with environmental standards, including adjustments to distances from protected areas and safeguards for biodiversity.

He stressed that the approval process has been strict and based on technical conditions, rejecting claims that the investment lacked proper oversight.

/a.f/r.e/u.sh/

The 1.4-billion-euro project in the coastal area near southern city of Vlora has sparked demonstrations by activists and civil society groups concerned about its potential environmental impact in a sensitive ecosystem home to flamingos, seals and sea turtles.

Rama said the protests were being used to advance broader political narratives and alleged that Albania was facing coordinated information attacks.

“Albania is in a hybrid war. We are being attacked,” Rama said. “I have seen this in other countries, but now I see it in my own.”

He said he was not referring to the protests themselves in isolation, but to what he described as a wider campaign in which environmental concerns were being used to mobilise public sentiment.

Asked who was behind it, Rama said: “Different forces that brought this from the first day this hybrid war started.”

He also said narratives circulating around the project included what he called unfounded claims of a secret arrangement involving Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and businessman Jared Kushner to relocate Palestinians to Albania.

“This is being weaponised on a large scale,” Rama said, adding that such claims were “a complete fantasy”.

The Prime Minister said the protests were part of a broader environment in which public concerns were being instrumentalised, while reiterating that allegations linking the project to population transfers were baseless.

/Euronews//e.xh/r.e/u.sh/