TIRANA, Mar. 11 – Head of the State Intelligence Service (SHISH) Helidon Bendo is reported to have told the Parliamentary Commission for National Security on Monday there have been efforts to increase Russian influence in Albania.
This was reported by Top Channel from an unknown source.
“Data analysis from 2018 points to an increase efforts from Russia to further extend its influence in the country,” Bendo was reported to have said without giving details on the actors official Moscow is allegedly using to increase its influence.
According to TCH, members of the commission asked Bendo to elaborate on his claims and give information whether Russian influence has reached high level of Albanian politics, to which Bendo replied negatively.
Further on, opposition lawmaker Myslym Murrizi asked Bendo whether the police force contains a group of corrupt cops.
“We can not analyze group actions but collect personalized information instead. It does not turn out that there a group of corrupt officers exists in the state police,” Bendo was quoted saying.
From the start of the session Bendo was asked whether the media could remain to report on the meeting, but he said the report is classified and should be presented behind close doors. Instead he said a summarized report of the meeting will be later made available for the media.
Meanwhile, a number of other media raised numerous doubts after TCH made leaks from the meeting public in a special reportage, saying Bendo’s words did nothing but reinforce a thesis Socialist Prime Minister Edi Rama and a number of diplomats supporting him have been using to portray Rama as a stabilizing factor for the region now that the country’s opposition has resigned its mandates and led political life to a deadlock.
According to a number of media, it was the socialist majority present in the behind-closed-doors meetings which leaked the information first to allegedly government-affiliated journalist Muhamed Veliu and then to pro-government TCH.
However, it is unclear whether the Socialist majority is simply using the facts to its favor or whether Bendo is directly serving the Socialist majority’s claims.
Bendo was decreed by President Ilir Meta almost a year after his presuccessor Visho Ajazi LIka resigned in November 2017. At the time, Lika’s resignation was faced with skepticism by the opposition and a number of political experts.
Opposition Democratic Party leader Lulzim Basha said back in November 2017 that Ajazi’s resignation was forced because he could speak about the ties between the government and organized crime networks.
Further on, experts said Ajazi was considered to be tied with formerly-leading Democrats, and that Bendo is more of a Rama-man. Rama was the one handing Bendo executive powers as vice director of SHISH during the year Meta refused to decree him as the head of SHISH.
However, the official reason behind Ajazi’s resignation remained personal initiative and a transfer to work as Albania’s Ambassador in NATO.
