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Jared Kushner bought $125M Albanian beachfront from alleged trafficker, report says

newsAug 11, 202616243

In April an entity tied to Jared Kushner wired about €110 million, roughly $125 million, to Miami businessman Artur Shehu for beachfront parcels on the Zvernec peninsula near Vlora, Albania, meant for a mega-resort with a casino, golf course and roughly 800 hotel rooms. Two months later Albania’s anti‑mafia unit SPAK issued an arrest warrant naming Shehu among 20 people accused of moving cocaine from South America into Europe and laundering proceeds through real estate. Prosecutors say there are reasonable suspicions the parcels Shehu sold were tied to forged ownership documents, including allegedly faked Ottoman-era records, and they froze the sale funds in a notary account. Shehu denies the allegations and says his family owned the land since Ottoman times. Reuters and the developers say there is no indication the buyers knew of suspicions when they closed and the project’s U.S. partners say acquisitions were lawful and that Albanian courts should resolve ownership. Villagers in Zvernec had sent Kushner’s firm a written warning about the land in September 2024, and local protests called the Flamingo Revolution plus opposition from farmers have since confronted the development. The combination of the criminal probe, frozen funds and sustained local protests has stalled the project and left the money tied up pending court and prosecutorial resolution.

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