Tirana Times, 01 February 2026 – The release of more than three million pages of documents linked to the Jeffrey Epstein case by the United States Department of Justice has expanded the scope of one of the most disturbing scandals of the past decade far beyond the United States. The newly disclosed material shows that Epstein’s network intersected not only with global elites but also with countries and individuals on the margins of international power, including Albania and the wider Western Balkans.
Albania appears in the files through two distinct episodes, five years apart, that together reveal how Epstein’s world operated simultaneously at the level of senior international officials and through informal recruitment channels targeting young individuals.
The first episode dates to May 2012 and involves Thorbjørn Jagland, then Secretary General of the Council of Europe and a former prime minister and foreign minister of Norway. Jagland visited Tirana as Albania assumed the rotating presidency of the Council of Europe, at a moment of political tension marked by disagreements over the choice of a new president to succeed Bamir Topi. In public, Jagland emphasized institutional stability and urged political consensus during meetings with Albanian leaders.
Privately, however, Jagland sent an email to Epstein one day after leaving Tirana, remarking that he had been in the Albanian capital and had encountered “exceptional girls.” The correspondence, now part of the Epstein file, appears casual in tone but deeply troubling in context, given Epstein’s well documented role as a sexual predator. Epstein’s reply suggested follow up contact through intermediaries, including references to Barbara Daniels and to Bill Richardson, a former US diplomat and politician whose name also appears elsewhere in the documents.
The released material does not indicate that any criminal acts occurred in Albania during Jagland’s visit, nor does it point to institutional involvement by Albanian authorities. What it does illustrate is the normalization of objectifying language and informal exchanges among senior international figures who maintained personal contact with Epstein, raising ethical questions about judgment, responsibility, and the culture of impunity surrounding elite networks.
A second Albanian related episode emerges from emails dated March 2017 and shifts the focus from elite correspondence to individual vulnerability. In this case, a 22 year old Albanian woman applied for work as a personal assistant through a contact whose name has been redacted in the files. In her email, she noted that she was not based in the United States and referenced Evan Luthra as the source through which she had learned of the opportunity.
According to the correspondence, the intermediary quickly requested photographs from the applicant and forwarded them to Epstein, asking whether she should be interviewed. A few days later, a video of the young woman was also sent. The documents do not clarify whether she was ever interviewed or employed, but they show how an apparently legitimate job inquiry could be rapidly transformed into a form of informal screening for Epstein’s purposes, reflecting a pattern seen repeatedly across the broader case.
A third strand of the newly public material broadens the regional dimension beyond Albania. Messages from 2018 cite Miroslav Lajčák, former foreign minister of Slovakia and later the European Union’s special representative for the Kosovo Serbia dialogue. The exchanges, reported by Dnevnik N, suggest a relationship that went beyond formal diplomatic contact, with Epstein mixing discussions of politics and diplomacy with comments about women and repeatedly addressing Lajcak by a familiar nickname.
The political significance of these revelations lies not only in the content of the messages but in the offices Lajcak held at the time, positions closely associated with European mediation, credibility, and public trust. Following the publication of the correspondence, Lajcak announced his immediate resignation from his post as adviser to the Slovak prime minister, while denying any wrongdoing and rejecting claims that he discussed women with Epstein.
The same reporting cycle has produced spillover implications elsewhere in the region. A former president of Montenegro has publicly denied any connection to Epstein, stating that he had no relationship or acquaintance with him and rejecting any suggestion of involvement. Even in the absence of definitive evidence of misconduct, the need for such denials highlights how politically toxic the Epstein file has become, particularly in smaller political systems where reputational damage can have immediate domestic and international consequences.
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