Only eight Albanian prisoners have been sent back to their homeland to serve their sentences as part of an £8million government scheme to deport the criminals.
In 2023, it was revealed that 200 Albanian thugs were being sent home, with the first 67 initially listed.
But only eight have left so far under the two year scheme which is costing the UK £4million a year, according to The Sun.
Twelve murderers, eight rapists and more than 100 found guilty of drug or firearm offences are just some of the Albanians who were expected to leave our shores.
The Ministry of Justice said when the deal was made that this scheme would ‘free up’ jail space in England and Wales and double the number of offenders without UK citizenship removed annually.
This comes as revealed over the weekend that up to one in 36 Albanians registered in the UK are serving time in prison, making up more than any other foreign nationality in UK prisons.
Between October 2022 and August 2024, 99.7 per cent of space in adult male prisons were taken.
The then-Justice Secretary Alex Chalk said at the time ‘the public expects that foreign criminals should serve their sentences overseas – not in our prisons at the expense of the taxpayer’.
‘This deal will speed up the removal of these offenders and give victims confidence that serious criminals will continue to face justice and spend the remainder of their sentence behind bars,’ he added.
The wait for the repatriation of the most violent criminals is allegedly due to lengthy administrative delays as Albanian courts must register a British sentence before the transfer can be completed.
One such criminal who was meant to be sent back was Ibraham Bezati.
The 38-year-old was jailed for 17 years after falsely imprisoning and raping a drugged woman in 2021.
A judge told Bezati that he ‘treated her like she was less than human’ and had put his victim through ‘every woman’s worst nightmare’.
But the ‘dangerous sexual predator’ has yet to continue the rest of his imprisonment in his own country.
Another violent lag is convicted killer Dorian Pirija, 36, who had been jailed for 19 years after planning to kill a rival Hartlepool drug dealer in 2021.
Hamawand Ali Hussein, 30, was blasted in the head with a sawn-off shotgun after Pirija made efforts to expand his drug kingdom.
Pirija was only charged with manslaughter and is yet to be returned to Albania.
Rapist Klodjan Samurri, 31, is also expecting repatriation after the predator was caught buttoning up his jeans as his victim begged for him to leave.
Although he lied to the woman’s friends saying she gave consent, Old Bailey Judge Bernard Richmond found that he had ‘targeted a vulnerable woman in her own bed’ and gave him seven years behind bars.
One criminal who has been sent back was drug kingpin Klodjan Copja.
He was flown back last March to serve his 17 years behind bars in Albania.
Erald Mema, who led an ‘enormous’ cocaine smuggling operation, has also been returned after being given 25 years in 2018.
However, it is believed he asked to go back because he could receive an earlier release granted by a parole board than he would of if he stayed in the UK.
These thugs are now serving their time in Albania’s most secure jail – Drenova Priosn – where they will stay until they serve half their sentence in custody.
The Ministry of Justice said that they were deploying specialist staff to 80 jails to speed up the removal of prisoners ‘who have no right to be in this country’.
The Sun reported that government sources stressed that only part of the £8million was paid each time a criminal was returned.
The money is said to be going towards the refurbishment of Albanian prisons, extra security, rehabilitation equipment, workshops and training for warders.
Prisoners cost £109 a day in the UK, compared to £32 in Albania.
The MoJ also highlighted that since the election, 2,925 foreign criminals have been removed, a 21% increase on the same period 12 months prior.
revealed that almost 1,100 Albanians, including murderers, kingpins of the feared Balkan mafia which controls the UK drug market and rapists, were behind bars at the end of 2024. Just three were women.
This is despite only 39,091 Albanian-born men reside here, according to Government data.
Albania topped ‘s league table of criminality by nationality, coming ahead of Guinea, Algeria, Vietnam, Sudan, Palestine and Eritrea.
In December, Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood said that even though the government was planning to open 14,000 more prison spaces, there was still a chance that would not be enough.
Last summer, some prisons in the UK were just 100 spaces away from reaching full capacity and freed thousands of inmates early in a bid to stop overcrowding.