Robert Budina: Filmmaker Whose Risky Escape from Albania Shaped His Work

The son of an army general in communist Albania, Robert Budina was part of the student protests that helped bring down the regime, only to flee to Italy on an overcrowded boat. The experience has informed his work ever since.

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Tirana’s Construction Boom and the Flow of Dirty Money

TIRANA, December 26, 2025 – Albania’s decade-long construction boom, long portrayed as a sign of growth and urban renewal, is increasingly being scrutinized as a vehicle for laundering illicit capital. A new study by the Friedrich Ebert Foundation, combined with years of investigative reporting and analysis by Tirana Times, points …

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Secret tenders, violence and kidnappings, BIRN: The staggering profits of AKSH contractors 

Tirana Times, 25 December, 2025 – On September 15, 2023, Ergys Agasi, 36, founded a company with a capital of 1 thousand lek (10 euros) with activity in the field of information technology. Under the name EA Solutions, the company had a rapid activity. In the balance sheet filed with …

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Saudi Arabia Leads AI Readiness in MENA, Emerges as Global Governance Power

As artificial intelligence reshapes economic competitiveness and state capacity, indexes like the Government AI Readiness Index serve not merely as technical rankings, but as indicators of national strategic priorities. In this sense, Saudi Arabia has moved decisively from regional ambition toward global relevance, even as the global hierarchy of AI …