Eurasia Press & News
The Interior Ministry on Monday announced the arrest of a police chief in Gjirokastra, accused of taking bribes from a businessman.Miklovan Kararaj, 26, head of the anti-corruption unit in the Gjirokastra police department, was detained after being accused of soliciting €10,000 from a businessman, the ministry said.
The authorities were “investigating other officers, suspecting that they may be involved in corrupt practices,” it added.
According to the Transparency International Corruption Perception Index, Albania ranks as one of the most corrupt countries in Europe.
The corruption perception survey, published by the Tirana-based Institute of Development Research Alternatives, IDRA, in 2012 noted that the police are perceived as corrupt by 66 per cent of the public.
The same survey found that slight less than half of the public trusted the police as an institution.
According to the survey, 28.4 per cent of the public declared they had witnessed at least one corrupt transaction involving a policeman while 8.2 per cent said a policeman had asked them to pay a bribe.
