Scientists point out that the Albanian coastline is among the hardest hit in Europe by the erosion of climate change and wild urbanization.
The communist dictatorship equipped the Albanian coast with bunkers, in the face of a possible nuclear attack. In the end, no atomic weapons challenged the resistance of these Cold War remnants. who now succumb to another enemy, rising sea levels.
“The bunkers were supposed to resist everything, but they have failed in their only battle, against the sea,” Ilir Zani, 80, told AFP, off the coast of Seman, in the center of this small Balkan country.
Several nuclear shelters were erected there during the Enver Hoxha dictatorship who, at odds with the West, the former Soviet Union, the former Yugoslavia and China, feared an attack from any front.
Now, the water has ended up covering them all. Also the police station, sports grounds or oil wells have succumbed. And on the beaches, uprooted tree trunks and collapsed roofs attest to the powerlessness in the face of the inexorable advance of the sea.
Scientists identify the Albanian coastline among the most affected in Europe by the erosion of climate change and wild urbanization.
According to the inhabitants of Seman, the Adriatic Sea has advanced 800 meters in three decades. Izmir Mernica, 47, fears that the water will swallow up her little bar, where her family lives.
The man points to an old water tower, now partially submerged several tens of meters into the sea. “We are all restless, the sea is swallowing everything. Look at that tower in front of which we used to park our cars ”.
“Two meters per year”
In 2009, authorities deployed military tanks to drag seven submerged bunkers back to shore, after several tourists were drowned by the eddies that the current creates around these structures.
Now the sea “has caught them again,” says Izmir bitterly.
According to reports from climate change experts from the UN Development Program (UNDP), “More than a third” of the 427 kilometers of coastline are “affected by erosion, at a rate of one to two meters per year ”.
Abdulla Diku, an environmental specialist, assures that for every hectare, about 27 tons of land end up in the sea every year, eleven times more than the European average.
In Qerret, in the north, 64-year-old Vlash Moçi still has his bunker, which once housed anti-aircraft guns.
He has transformed it into a bar that attracts foreign tourists curious about Hoxha’s paranoid reign, which had more than 170,000 bunkers built and numerous underground tunnels supposedly resistant to a nuclear attack.
The neighboring bunker, a pale green structure that looks like a flying saucer, already has its base in the water.
“We are afraid that one day the huge waves will swallow us. It’s terrible, ”he tells AFP.
Volunteers, homeowners and hotel owners in Qerret have illegally built rock breakwaters perpendicular to the sea. But these structures have modified the currents and have worsened the situation, according to specialists.
All against
“These are individual solutions that exacerbate the problem and harm biodiversity and marine ecosystems,” warns Mirela Kamberi, a UNDP specialist.
Everything is united in favor of the advance of the sea.
First, there is climate change, which multiplies extreme weather events and increases temperatures and sea levels. The experts predict that the water in Albania will be in 2100 between 40 and 105 centimeters above the average level of 1986-2005.
But there are also deforestation, the extraction of sand from the coast, which accelerates this process, and wild urbanism on the coast.
“The problem is that people have cut down almost all the fir trees to build buildings, destroying the systems of nature,” protests Besnik Zara, 66, throwing her fishing pole into the water. “Here, even the fish have disappeared.”
From Shupal Mountain, near Tirana, it is easy to see the damage from erosion, land degradation and water from the rivers that flow into Lake Bovilla.
This place, which feeds the capital with drinking water, “It is considered a hot spot for erosion”says Abdulla Diku.
To cope, the authorities in 2016 banned the exploitation of forest resources and adopted the commitments of the UN climate summits in Paris and Glasgow.
The government also strengthened the legislation. “Environmental crimes will be treated by the penal code as a crime against life, property or an organized gang,” warned the Interior Minister, Blendi Cuçi. (I)
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