FILE PHOTO: Jared Kushner, former senior advisor to the president during the administration of his father-in-law, former President Donald Trump, speaks about the Abraham Accords during an event at the Trump affiliated America First Policy Institute in Washington, September 12, 2022. REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein/File Photo
TIRANA (Reuters) - Albania's government has granted strategic investor status to a company linked to Donald Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner to build a luxury resort on an uninhabited Mediterranean island that was once a military outpost.
The Balkan country's Strategic Investment Committee, headed by Prime Minister Edi Rama, on Dec. 30 accepted a proposal by Atlantic Incubation Partners LLC for the 45-hectare project on the small island of Sazan, involving a planned investment of 1.4 billion euros ($1.4 billion).
In the written decision, seen by Reuters on Thursday, the committee said the project complied with legislation on strategic investment and on the number of jobs required by the legislation, saying it would employ an estimated 1,000 people.
Under the law, the granting of strategic investment status allows companies to implement an investment project that is deemed strategic as part of a strategic sector of the economy such as tourism.
"The form of the state's participation in this investment will be realised through the establishment of a joint legal entity," the committee said, adding that it would include the state-run Albanian Investment Corporation.
Reuters could not immediately reach Atlantic Incubation Partners for comment.
Last year, Kushner announced plans to build a tourist resort in Zvernec in southern Albania as part of a wider investment by his Affinity Partners in the Balkans that also includes the project on Sazan, off the Albanian coast, and a project in a former army headquarters in the Serbian capital Belgrade.
Kushner, who served as a top aide to Trump during his father-in-law's first term as U.S. president, set up the investment firm in 2021. Trump is due to be inaugurated for a second term on Tuesday.
The projects could boost local economies by enticing visitors, but the company faces opposition from critics who say they will harm the environment or, in the case of Belgrade, threaten sites of cultural significance.
($1 = 0.9715 euros)
(Reporting by Florion Goga, writing by Daria Sito-Sucic; Editing by Timothy Heritage)
