Jared and Ivanka's Albanian island

The Albanian government has approved a controversial $1.4 billion deal with Donald Trump's son-in-law to develop the island of Sazan into a "luxury resort", said Balkan Insight.

Sazan, an uninhabited island off the southern city of Vlorë, was an "isolated military outpost" of Fascist Italy and later of Communist-era Albania.

Jared Kushner's investment firm, Affinity Partners, has "big plans for tiny Albania", said Air Mail, and although "not all of the plans are crazy", they have already elicited plenty of opposition.

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Lavish and Jurassic

Albania's "Cold War designation" as the "North Korea of Europe" means it is one of the last undeveloped spots in Western Europe.

Affinity's plans include a 1,100-acre luxury resort on the country's Adriatic Coast, with 6,000 hotel rooms and villas. Architectural plans for the project show "modernist multistorey structures" built along the shore, dunes and headlands around the Narta lagoon, a spot currently "prized by birders for its rich avian diversity", said The New York Times.

On Sazan itself, which lies about six miles off the coast from the edge of the lagoon, within a national marine park, the firm wants to build a "similarly lavish" 1,400-acre resort community.

The island's landscape is "Jurassic", said The Guardian, with "ferns, giant lavender, plumbago, rosemary, broom and laurels" growing on its central mountain, which enjoys "dramatic sunsets" and "dizzyingly beautiful" views.

More corruption

Negotiations about the sale of Sazan were "kept secret" from residents and parliamentarians, who weren't aware of the $1.4 billion deal until it was reported in the media.

Those reports "have stirred resentments among some local landowners who question whether the Albanian government is courting Mr Kushner in order to curry political favour with his father-in-law", said The New York Times. The prime minister, Edi Rama, has forcefully denied this suggestion.

With Sazan "on the verge" of becoming a "mecca for ultra-luxury tourism", there are lots of questions from environmentalists, said The Guardian. The area is "prized for its biodiversity", said the NYT. A local ornithologist said that there will be a "tremendous" ecological and economic cost to development.

Kushner, who is married to the US president's daughter Ivanka Trump, and his team have dismissed the concerns. Asher Abehsera, the executive overseeing the developments, said the firm recognises the "rich biodiversity and natural landscape" of the area and have a "master plan" designed to "restore and improve ecological conditions".

But even so locals have "expressed fears of overtourism" and water shortages, or that they would lose their land or public access to the lagoon and beaches. Others said that "more infrastructure" would only mean "more government corruption".

Albanians are "not anti-tourism", said one. They're just "against tourism that will destroy our land and our traditions".