Arrests hit crime syndicate

TIRANA, Jan. 30 – Albanian police say they have scored a major victory on organized crime with the discovery of a group suspected to be involved in a series of deadly crimes in the past two years in four major Albanian cities.
Three people have been arrested, among them a 30 -year-old man who is suspected of being a contract killer and has allegedly committed at least 20 murders in Albania and Greece. Police found an arsenal of weapons and explosives in his Tirana apartment.
Using a confidential informant, police said they caught the group as they were preparing the murder of another businessman in Tirana.
The police operation comes as Albanians have become increasingly worried about a series of remote-controlled explosions that have killed or wounded several people in Tirana, Vlora, Durres and Shkodra.
Police suspect the group arrested this week is involved in at least two murders that occurred in Vlora in 2012 and 2013, and setting explosives in four other cases, including in the attempted assassinations of political leaders like Socialist Vlora Prefect Besnik Dervishi, a few weeks ago, and Vlora Democratic Party leader Ardian Kollozi, last year.
Police got the first lead with the arrest last Saturday of 30-year-old Julian Sinanaj, who allegedly now faces more than 20 murder charges and has also attracted the interest of Greek authorities for contract killings he has allegedly carried out south of border.
Police said he had become an expert at the production and placement of remotely-controlled explosives.
The other people arrested in the case included, Marion Mitro, a former state employee detained at the airport as he was trying to flee the country. Mitro worked at the Construction Inspectorate of the Municipality of Vlora, and is suspected of being the man who ordered the attempted assassination of the region’s prefect. Vlora has been the epicenter of a massive government effort to demolish seaside buildings, and the failed attack was big news in Albania because the explosives were found before they were set off by guards of the prime minister’s office as the prefect visited on business.
A third person, whose name has not been released, has also been arrested, while two other have been declared wanted.
“This is definitely spectacular blow against organized crime in the history of the State Police,” Interior Minister Saimir Tahiri said in a statement.

Interior minister unhappy with intelligence service’s work
The news came just a couple days after Tahiri had told a parliamentary commission the police were working hard to solve the string of crimes. But he had also complained that the country’s intelligence service, SHISH, is providing no information to help police solve what Tahiri called “terrorist acts and crimes” that were recently taking place “almost in an organized way.”
Tahiri was formally called to report to the Albanian parliament’s security commission about what the authorities had done on the investigation of the killing of two Albanian brothers in neighboring Greece, not far from the border line in Kapshtice in southeast. But then the questioning moved on to security in general.
The crime situation has often led to political debate and accusations. The opposition Democratic Party called on Tahiri to consider resigning from the post, accusing him and the government of letting the crime reign free.
Tahiri acknowledged that there have been a series of serious crimes in recent months. He also said that there has been an “unjustifiable increase” of the use of explosives set by cellular phones. The minister considered such crimes as “terrorist acts” and said they will be treated as such.
In addition to the car bombs, there have been a series of explosions in recent weeks, starting with one in north Albania, which tried to bring down main high-voltage power line and continued with others, used under the cars of officials or businessmen, or at their homes and apartments. Some Socialist MPs have suggested there are political reasons behind the power pylon attack, because the attackers at written messages about taxes on the pylon. The new government is overhauling the taxation system.
Tahiri complained, however, that four-month-old government had found police in a bad situation, without informers or real capacities to fight crime in depth.
Tahiri directly accused the State Information Service, or SHISH as the intelligence service is known by its Albanian acronym, of “inactivity, lack of information and not giving information on acts that violate national security.”
SHISH is headed by an official with ties to the former government of the now main opposition Democratic Party, and coordinated coverage against the intelligence service by pro-government media indicates that the governing Socialists are preparing to fire him, analysts say.
“I believe that in the fight against such acts, despite their unjustifiable increase, almost artificial, beyond the declarative cooperation, a fundamental cooperation is needed. And I do not consider fundamental cooperation having zero information from SHISH,” said Tahiri.
The opposition Democrats consider the crime situation in the country as dire, and accuse the government of not knowing how to handle law enforcement. The Democrats’ leader, Lulzim Basha, has directly accused the Socialists of “inspiring crime” through their actions and handling of police matters.
With armed robberies now taking place in some highways and several high-profile murders in a row, Albanians are increasingly worried that the gains in rule of law Albania had made in previous years could be lost.
But authorities say that despite the headline-grabbing nature of the recent crime wave, statistically, crime rates are down compared to last year.

Authorities seek to better enforce cell phone registration law
The Interior Ministry has asked the Authority of the Electronic and Post Communication, or AKEP, to order that of all cell phone numbers that don’t have an identified owner be canceled and also limit the number of cell phone SIM cards a single person can register.
The move comes after cell phones were used to detonate several explosions this month, some of which have also killed people.
A few days ago a TNT explosion seriously damaged an apartment in northern Shkodra, while last week a businessman died after his car exploded with TNT commanded from remote controlled cell phones.
By law, every Albanian cell phone number needs to be registered to someone who provides an ID to get the process started. But the investigation in the bombings has revealed they they used cell phone numbers were not registered or that were sold by traders who have hundreds of phone numbers under their names and such a phenomenon “directly violates national security, public order and above all the citizens’ life,” according to the minister’s letter to AKEP.