The Spy Who Wasn’t Vetted

A fired Kosovar spy now leads Albania’s intelligence, sparking fears over loyalty and foreign sway as Edi Rama enters a fourth term, has the shadow state overtaken the real one?

As Albania cast its votes on 11 May 2025, with Edi Rama¹ cruising toward an expected fourth term², the machinery of state appears more consolidated than ever. But nestled within the more conventional trappings of incumbency, campaign buses, ribbon-cutting ceremonies, and well-rehearsed television appearances lurks a quieter, more opaque shift: the entrenchment of intelligence power in the hands of a political dynasty that has long blurred the lines between governance and control.

Central to that development is Vlora Hyseni, a Kosovar national with a controversial past in her own country’s intelligence establishment. Two years ago, Rama secured her appointment as Director of Albania’s State Intelligence Service (SHISH), a move confirmed by presidential decree but scarcely debated in public. Her path to the post, however, was anything but conventional.

A Quiet Appointment, A Loud Question

In June 2021, Hyseni was dismissed from her role as Deputy Director of the Kosovo Intelligence Agency under circumstances never fully explained³. The joint decision by President Vjosa Osmani and Prime Minister Albin Kurti was rooted in classified provisions of national law, compelling her to surrender sensitive materials and reminding her of the criminal penalties tied to the mishandling of state secrets. Within three months, she had been quietly installed as a national security adviser in Rama’s inner circle. In 2023, she was elevated further, taking the helm of SHISH⁴, a position she now occupies as Albania moves toward yet another Rama-led government.

It is a trajectory that raises fundamental questions. What does it mean for a sovereign state to place its intelligence infrastructure in the hands of a foreign national, particularly one ousted from a parallel role across the border? What are the legal, ethical, and strategic implications of such an appointment during an electoral season where transparency is demanded but rarely supplied?

In the Balkans, where the scars of war have hardened into protocols of surveillance and suspicion, intelligence appointments are never merely technocratic. They are acts of trust, or mistrust performed on a geopolitical stage. Hyseni’s role within Rama’s Albania signals not only a tightening grip on the state’s most clandestine apparatus but perhaps also a quiet repositioning of regional alliances, loyalties, and the very definition of national interest.

Since 2023, The Gunpowder Chronicles has tracked how Vlora Hyseni, dismissed from Kosovo’s intelligence agency, was quietly appointed by Edi Rama to lead Albania’s State Intelligence Service. What began as a backroom decision has become a serious legal and political issue.

A Legal Rubicon Crossed

Had this happened within the EU, it would have sparked a scandal. The EU depends on strict rules of trust between intelligence agencies. A dismissed intelligence official from one country cannot simply walk into a top job in another, especially without transparency or vetting. EU law, including Directive 2016/680⁵ and national secrecy acts⁶, would likely block such a move or lead to sanctions.

Albania, still an EU candidate, is not bound by those laws, but the expectation is clear: EU standards require accountability, loyalty, and respect for state secrecy. Hyseni’s appointment defies that.

Under Albania’s intelligence law (Law 65/2014)⁷, the SHISH director must show “loyalty to the Republic.” Hyseni is a Kosovar national, and there’s no public record of her Albanian citizenship or vetting. That alone raises constitutional concerns.

Kosovo’s laws are even stricter. When she was dismissed in 2021, Hyseni was legally warned not to use or reveal classified information. Doing so would be a criminal offence under Kosovo’s Penal Code and Law on Information Classification. Her new role could place her in direct violation of those laws.

In short: this appointment would not be tolerated in the EU. It bypasses transparency, challenges Kosovo’s legal authority, and exposes a deep flaw in how Albania handles national security at the highest level.

The Shadow State, Captured on Film