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| From the left: Damjan Gjiknuri, Charles McGonigal and Agron Nezaj |
New details have emerged from the visits of former senior FBI official Charles McGonigal, who was arrested Monday on charges of collaborating with Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska and money laundering. He had visited Tirana several times and in the prosecution's file, there is talk of meetings with Prime Minister Edi Rama as well as meetings with a former employee of the Albanian intelligence service, meetings that he did not report to his bosses, local media writes.
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| Agron Nezaj handing over the medal to Charles McGonigal |
From what has been discovered on the network, it can be seen that in one of the visits he was also honored with the "Gratitude of Tropoja" medal. The news was published in 2021 by the mayor, Rexh Byberi. According to him, the motivation behind such an honor was the fact that McGonigal has shown a permanent love for the Albanian nation. Damian Gjiknuri and Ardian Çela were also at the ceremony.
"Today in Tirana I was particularly privileged to hand over the awarded medal 'Gratitude of Tropoja' to Mr. Charles McGonigal, a former important personality with the rank of SAC of the most powerful investigative agency in the world, the FBI.
Mr. McGonigal has shown permanent love for our Homeland and Nation. Apart from my staff, the deputies of the Parliament of Albania, Mr. Damian Gjiknuri and Mr. Ardian Çela, participated in this very friendly and cordial ceremony. Mr. McGonigal was accompanied as always by his friend, our honorable fellow Albanian-American Agron Nezaj" - writes the mayor of Tropoja.