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The company 'Hill International NV' was paid by the EU for assistance, but ended up partnering with Evis Berber in the abuse of the Llogara tender.

2025-11-12 23:32:44Aktualitet SHKRUAR NGA REDAKSIA VOX
Ioannis Kirkinezis, Evis Berberi and Belinda Balluku

We have often seen that many corruption scandals are hidden behind an ambassador who makes supportive statements, or internationals who remain silent in the face of them. Just as we have seen corruption at the highest levels of American institutions, such as the case of former FBI director Charles McGonigal. Even in the Llogara tunnel scandal, there seems to be no shortage of traces, or at least suspicions, of international corruption.

In the file, SPAK has also extended the investigation to a foreign company, Hill International. This company arrived in Albania with great fanfare as a consultant paid by the European Union to advise the Albanian government on major infrastructure projects. From an international brand advertised by Edi Rama, as European assistance in Albania, SPAK documents show us that Hill International has ended up as a partner of Evis Berber in the abuse of tenders.

Details on the activity in Albania of the company Hill International are learned from the file of the Special Prosecution for the Llogara Tunnel. The Plug program read with great attention the Decision on the Communication of the Charge against citizen Mirzeta Kashnica and found some very interesting data that it investigated further. On page 4 of the decision, the prosecutor analyzes the consultancy via e-mails between Hill International.

SPAK

The following describes that on 03.12.2020, citizen Joseph Obeid, an expert from the consultant Hill International, sent by email the draft of the standard tender documents for the Llogara tunnel project. The procurement unit explained that for the drafting of the special criteria, some of the criteria suggested in the consultant's draft were used. Regarding the drafting of the standard tender documents, it results that on 03.12.2020, at 15.38, citizen Joseph Obeid with the email address [email protected] sent an email to citizen Arta Gurabardhi, with the email address agurabardhi@gmail,com, informing her that attached to this email she will find the revised version of the draft standard tender documents. Also on 03.12.2020, citizen Joseph Obeid sent an email to citizen Jetmira Dervishi, where attached is the document titled "01 Llogara Tunnel TDV" and he writes that below he will find the email he sent to Arta earlier."

On page 8 of the decision, the prosecutor reveals another important detail, that the tender deadlines were also extended at the suggestion of the Hill International company, which has the role of consultant.

SPAK

With the minutes of the Procurement Unit, dated 31.12.2020, based on the letter no. 8963/2prot, dated 30.12.2020 of the Director of the project for technical assistance of the Ministry of Infrastructure and Energy, citizen Ioannis Kirkinezis, it was decided to draft an appendix amending appendix 12 "Special qualification criteria". With the letter no. 8526/6, dated 24.12.2020, of the Secretary General of the Ministry of Infrastructure and Energy, citizen Viola Haxhiademi, an appendix was drafted to change the criteria and extend the tender deadline.

So according to what the prosecutor writes in the file, the Consultant changed the criteria with a letter dated 30.12.2020, while Viola Haxhiademi approved them 6 days ago, on 24.12.2020, also extending the tender deadline. Maybe it's a slip of the tongue, but with what we've seen in other files such as incinerators, check-ups, etc., of course with the Rilidnas anything is possible.

After reading these two passages in the file, we decided to investigate further, who these citizens are, under what consultancy contract they were selected, and who pays them.

The company Hill International NV was registered with the Central Bank of Albania on 21.06.2019, as a branch of a foreign company. The company Hill International NV is registered in the Netherlands. The company's administrator would be the Greek citizen, Emmanouil Sigalas.

The registration address is "Papa Gjon Pali Il-te" Street, Building No. 12, ABA Business Center, 12th Floor.

In the NOTES appendix, in the balance sheet declared in the year of establishment, the company specifies:

Hill International NV

The branch has started its activity in Albania, based on the Service Contract "Europe Aid/139665/DH/SER/AL" concluded between HILL International NV and the European Union, represented by the European Commission, within the framework of technical assistance for capacity building and planning, preparation and implementation of infrastructure projects in Albania.

Further verifications revealed that the Hill Company was selected by the European Commission within the framework of the IPA 2015 Action program for assistance to Albania in support of a country that has entered the integration process, and the duration of this program, i.e. the assistance that Hill would provide to the Albanian government, would last for 36 months.

EUROPEAN COMMISSION

The IPA 2015 Action Programme for Albania - Facilitation for Integration into the European Union has a component for the provision of Technical Assistance (TA) to the Government of Albania for capacity building in the identification, formulation, implementation and monitoring of large infrastructure projects. The aim is to support the establishment of a structure to provide technical assistance to several Albanian institutions/agencies responsible for the implementation of large infrastructure projects/programmes in key sectors such as Transport, Energy, Environment, Social Infrastructure and Business Infrastructure. The TA will provide a team of experts who will identify needs and assist and train the beneficiary institutions/agencies to improve their capacities for the implementation of infrastructure projects. The TA will contribute to improving their skills in managing such projects, from the identification phase to closure, through training, on-the-job training and other capacity support tools. This TA also includes support for planning and coordination, preparation and updating of the pipeline of Single National Priority Projects.

So it is clear that this company has been selected by the European Commission to provide assistance in Albania and this service will be paid entirely from EU funds, according to the definitions of the IPA funds. According to the balance sheet for 2019, this company had 3 employees and as its object it declares that it provides consultancy to the Albanian Government. In this year, its income would be over 70 million new lek. But some interesting data from the company's balance sheet shows that in addition to EU funds, Hill International has also started to receive payments from the Albanian Government. Specifically, in 2019, it benefited from the Council of Ministers payment of 31 million lek or about 310,000 euros at today's exchange rate.

The PLUG show searched several databases to see if this company was the winner of any tender in Albania for 2020, but no such data was found. The only time the Albanian Government mentions Hill International's name is at the conference on July 1, 2020, where they announce the procedure for the Milot-Fier road. But in her speech, Minister Balluku states that this consultancy was paid for entirely with European Union funds.

Even for this year, the number of employees is 3, although it continues to be declared in Taxes as a company with a loss of 28 million lek. In the 2021 balance sheet, the company declares changes for 2020 as well, as it declares higher expenses and a larger loss. Expenses reach the value of 104 million lek and the loss is 38 million lek. The loss continues for 2021 at the value of 12 million.

In January 2023, citizen Ioannis Kirkinezis was appointed as administrator, and it seems that things are starting to change for Hill International.

In 2022, the company declares that it has 148 million lek uncollected from the Council of Ministers but also has about 30 million lek uncollected from domestic and foreign suppliers. We recall that in May 2021, this company signed the contract with the Ministry of Interior for the supervision of the Llogara tunnel.

The PLUG show analyzed the invoices of this company to see if the declared and unpaid revenues from the Council of Ministers were related to the Llogara Tunnel or to some other procedure that has not been made transparent. According to the information declared in the treasury, the first invoice issued for the Llogara Tunnel is dated 08.07.2022. Hill International has benefited for 2022, 48 million lek in payments from the Ministry of Infrastructure. So it is clear that the 110,000,000 lek new addition to the unpaid invoices from the Council of Ministers for 2022 were not related at all to the Llogara Tunnel since the entire contract for 3 years would be 196,000,000 lek.

The Plug show addressed a request for information to the Council of Ministers, asking what their relationship is with the Hill International company, whether they have contracted services from this company beyond the consultancy contract paid by the European Union, and how much the Council of Ministers paid to the Hill International company, since in the company's balance sheet for 2022 the amount not received from the Council of Ministers amounts to 148 million lek, for 2023 it is 144 million and for 2024 it is 73 million.

While it came to Albania as an international brand with experience in the EU and the US, Hill International this year will result in part of the corrupt network of Albanian projects. In May 2022, the company Hill International signs a contract with the Ministry of Infrastructure and Energy for the Supervision of Works for the construction of the Llogara Tunnel. This tender, which is the subject of investigation by SPAK, and for which Ervis Berberi is in prison, raises serious questions about Hill International, since as has already been proven by SPAK, the tender has serious violations.

The tender with the object of supervising the works in the facility "Construction of the Llogara Tunnel" on the Orikum-Himar road section, part of the SH8 Highway (Vlora - Saranda), was announced on November 25, 2021, while the tender was held a month later, on December 27 of that year. The value of the tender limit fund was 196,240,667 excluding VAT or about 1.9 million euros. The competition was attended by the union of operators "Stucky" ltd & "Gjeokonsult & CO" sh.pk and the union of operators "Hill International NV" & "NetGroup" sh.pk, where the latter would also result in the winner of this procedure with the bid of 194,700,000 or almost 95 percent of the value of the limit fund.

Plug managed to obtain details from SPAK's investigation file on abuses in the supervision tender. According to the contract, the company "Hill International NV" and the company of Valter Begaj, Evis Berberi's friend, NET-GROUP, would have to supervise the works and then deliver the completed work of the Llogara Tunnel within a period of 34 months. This tender is suspected to be predetermined. Important data that substantiated this fact were revealed from the messages of the "blackberry" phone that SPAK seized from the former head of ARRSH Evis Berberi. The investigation revealed that the representative of the Dutch company "Hill International NV", Ioannis Kirkinezis, drafted the standard tender documents for the supervision of the works in the Llogara Tunnel. The investigation has also revealed that Evis Berberi was the person who directed Greek citizen Ioannis Kirkinezis to cooperate with the administrator of the Albanian company "NET-GROUP", Valter Begaj, to create a cooperation agreement and participate in the procurement procedure.

So in summary, the Hill International Company, after being paid by the European Union to advise the Albanian government on how to carry out projects and public procurements, after advising on how the criteria should be set, drafted the procedures themselves, and finally entered the competition together with the company of Elvis Berber and Valter Begaj, to win the tender. And while supervising the works, the company of the director of the ARRSH, together with the company paid by the European Union to come to Albania, forgot to notice the lack of a bridge.

Hill International, according to the contract from the European Union, was supposed to be in Albania as the Albanian government's consulate, but it seems that Albanian taxpayers' money was seen as a good business opportunity, coupled with close cooperation with the leaders of the institutions that provided these funds.

The supervision of the Llogara Tunnel is not the only tender that Hill International has won. Also from the Albanian Road Authority, under the leadership of Elvis Berber, Hill International, in 2024 won the tender worth up to 14.5 million new lekë for the supervision of the works of the “Traffic Monitoring Center Phase Two”. Winning this tender further confirms the cooperation between Berber and the administrator of Hill International, citizen Ioannis Kirkinezis. The traffic monitoring project was again related to the road axes for which the Hill company had been agreed by the EC to consult the Albanian government, which started from Milot and ended in Palasë.

Hill International also turns out to be the winner of another tender awarded by the Albanian Development Fund.

According to the announcement dated 25.08.2021 by the ADF, this company, together with the Civil Cons company, have won the tender worth 245,000 euros for "Supervision of urban integration works in the Municipality of Gjirokastra."

It remains unclear how this company, which in 2019 was selected by the European Union to provide assistance in the field of infrastructure for a period of 3 years, ends up being the beneficiary of millions of euros through tenders in the field of infrastructure awarded precisely by the institutions with which it collaborated. In the case of the Llogara Tunnel, the situation is even more flagrant since Hill International has been involved with its consultancy since the DST of the project to the DST of the 190 million euro tender and finally wins the tender to monitor the works. For this, SPAK has also questioned the Greek administrator of the company Ioannis Kirkinezis. The latter has stayed at SPAK for over 6 hours giving explanations and after the end of the official hours, the prosecutor of the case, Dritan Prençi, has made sure that the Greek's testimony was interrupted and then continued the next day. Kirkinezis has cooperated with the prosecution, showing the full dynamics that led him and Valter Begaj's "Net-Group" to win the 2 million euro contract for the supervision of the Llogara tunnel works. He has confirmed to BKH investigators and prosecutor Prençi all the agreements he made in 2021 and onwards with Valter Begaj of "Net-Group" who is now in prison, as well as the business with the director of the ARRSH Alvis Berberi, who according to EU payments, should have served as an advisor and not as a partner in winning the tenders.

According to official documents already seized by SPAK, the company "Hill International NV" of the Greek engineer and "Net Group" of Valter Begaj, have benefited in total from 14 transactions made by the Ministry of Infrastructure, 1 billion and 979 million lek, or about 2 million euros.

The Plug show addressed the European Union office in Tirana and the OLAF office, requesting information on whether this company is in a conflict of interest and whether OLAF has ascertained or investigated these indications during the audit regarding the Hill International company, and moreover, since at the beginning of the episode, the objective and independent consultancy of this company was advertised by Prime Minister Edi Rama as the internationalization of infrastructure projects.

SPAK suspects it as part of tender abuse, as Hill International together with Elvis Berber's and Valter Begaj's company won the supervision tender. Prime Minister Edi Rama sells it as an international guarantee of his tenders. It now remains for the European Union to clarify whether Hill International, brought to Albania from the taxes of European citizens, fulfills the mission for which it was contracted, or whether it, like many cases in the past, has been used as a mask for the Europeanization of Albanian corruption. / Syri.net

 


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