Two teenagers injured by Lazarat stray bullets

GJIROKASTER, Sept 25 – Two teenagers were injured in the southern village of Dervican, likely from stray bullets fired from the nearby Lazarat village, known as the most lawless place in Albania, where residents shoot every night to keep police away. Dervican village, where the injuries happened, is part of the Dropulli region, an ethnic Greek minority area.
Neighboring lawless Lazarat is a well-known place where marijuana is grown and then trafficked to Western Europe. It is also still a no-go area from police. Authorities have only stopped people going there to work or taking water supplies for the plants. They do not dare go into the village for fear of causalities on both sides. It is a big challenge for the new government and new Interior Minister Saimir Tahiri. Italian authorities showed in August that Lazarat grows up to 900 tons of cannabis a year, worth 4.5 billion euros in market value, or half of Albania’s GDP. Albania is cannabis producing country, likely the first in Europe, and also a transit point for other hard drugs like heroin and cocaine, according to international organizations. Earlier this week, police seized 350 kilograms of cannabis abandoned in a speedboat in the southwestern port city of Vlora, somewhere in the seaside area, or the Riviera. Police said that some 11 bags full of marijuana were found on a six-meter single-engine speedboat, which was abandoned on the shores of Zvernec, some 10 kilometers north-east of the city of Vlora on Monday. No persons were arrested and the investigation is ongoing.