BIRN and Gjergj Erebara are leading the war against the tourism industry

BIRN, an NGO funded for investigative journalism, has put itself at the forefront of the war against Albania’s tourism sector. They are openly cheering the attacks while trying to downplay the financial and moral damage inflicted on these enterprises.

When the campaign began a week ago—driven by public calls and coordination with protest organizers—BIRN became deeply worried over why the police announced they were investigating the organizers' battle against the tourism sector.

In a speculative piece of propaganda, Reporter.al—BIRN’s Tirana publication—questioned why the police were investigating online reviews. They tried to justify the attacks as "free speech," even though the police were clearly targeting a terror campaign against businesses, not genuine customer reviews.

BIRN’s article was a textbook example of propaganda journalism. It read like a revolutionary pamphlet celebrating the execution of private business as a triumph of the cause.

As an NGO funded for years by Soros and Western embassies in Tirana, the article dangerously implied that these sponsors shared their stance—which is pure speculation. Years ago, the U.S. Embassy in Tirana cut its funding to BIRN specifically for violating reporting standards. Today, their sponsors are several EU representations in Tirana.

BIRN’s outrage over a police investigation into this economic terror campaign clearly exposes their partisan, lynch-mob mentality toward anyone who refuses to support the attack.

In another article, they targeted long-time commentators of Tema newspaper, trying to track down their real identities simply because they didn’t seem like "real people" to them.

The exact same media outlet that encourages anonymous negative reviews against businesses is suddenly obsessed with identifying Altin Ketro—even while admitting he has written for the newspaper since 2009.

The real reason is that Tema does not support their "revolution"—even though most of our newsroom actually participated in the protests during the first few weeks, before the movement was taken over by the gang that hijacked it.

For two days now, Google has been auditing these reviews, and many hotels and restaurants have regained their original ratings.

Yet today, Gjergj Erebara—a BIRN journalist who is also part of the protest's organizing structure—still seems to hope Google won't delete all of them.

In a shameful post today, he shared a screenshot of Gjergj Luca’s restaurant in Elbasan—an establishment still under attack, with its rating dropped from 4.7 to 1.2. He attempted some dark humor, gloating to the Prime Minister that his dirty war is still yielding results.

We are no longer dealing with a journalist here, but a hitman inciting terror against businesses and taking pride in it.

This same person has incited attacks against journalists who do not support the protest, directing articles and online campaigns against them—including Tema.

Of course, we are not worried about BIRN. Thanks to the mediocrities working there, their total readership is barely equal to a peripheral column in our newspaper—the kind that not even we, who publish them, bother to read.

But the speculation that because they are an NGO funded by Western embassies they have the right to attack Albanian business is filthy. It implicates their sponsors in activity that is fundamentally terroristic and will have consequences.

When someone like Andi Bushati does the same thing, at least everyone knows he is sponsored by oligarchs and by Berisha, only to play the "bad cop" with them later. They don't mind—they gave him permission to do it. Like him, I have seen plenty of other journalists these past few days playing dumb, pretending the police are investigating customer reviews rather than a digital terror campaign. Apparently, we needed this campaign to see their cannibalistic side.

Yet I do not know how Gjergj Erebara can feel so ecstatic, or how he cannot control his joy over destroying someone else's business through his public calls. Apparently, his dream is for someone to sue him so he can gain fame as a victim of "counter-revolutionary" businesses.

In fact, his real victim is BIRN more than the businesses he attacks. His assaults say a lot about where Western millions for the Albanian press actually go: into a closed newsroom controlled by a family circle, weaponized entirely for personal and political attacks on their behalf.

Originally published in Albanian as: BIRN dhe Gjergj Erebara po udhëheqin betejën kundër turizmit