Albania struggles with a legacy pollution

TIRANA, Nov. 16 – As Albania rejected a proposal to destroy Syrian chemical weapons on Albanian soil, the country’s residents were also reminded that there are many dangerous chemicals already in the country.
Prime Minister Edi Rama said in his half-an-hour speech on the refusal of the proposal to destroy those Syrian chemicals that there are 31 areas in the country with dangerous chemicals remained from the previous military sites or industrial production.
There are especially nine dangerous sites and the central city of Elbasan tops the list.
To rehabilitate such areas spread all around the country in capital Tirana, Berat, Perrenjas, Korce, Elbasan, Rreshen the authorities would need some 620 million euro, a huge figure for the tiny western Balkan country.
The new Tirana government is fighting hard to find the proper financial means to get its economy back on track complaining that the previous government had dried up the budget.