29
Fri, Mar
51 New Articles

Albania Doubles Down on Energy and EU Acquis: A Buzz Interview with Sabina Lalaj of Deloitte Legal

Albania Doubles Down on Energy and EU Acquis: A Buzz Interview with Sabina Lalaj of Deloitte Legal

Albania
Tools
Typography
  • Smaller Small Medium Big Bigger
  • Default Helvetica Segoe Georgia Times

As the Albanian government seeks to utilize the energy crisis as a catalyst for encouraging energy investments and production, significant changes are expected in the country's overall legislation – in light of the negotiation process – to comply with EU standards, according to Deloitte Legal Local Legal Partner Sabina Lalaj.

"Albania's notable features nowadays include the energy crisis and the government's efforts to try and turn that into momentum to foster investments in energy production," Lalaj begins. "The government’s aim is to make Albania self-sufficient throughout the year and an energy exporting country." According to her, it is evident that Albania is experiencing a boom in energy production investments, "particularly in wind and solar energy, as the government is favorable to facilitate the development of energy projects. To this end, the government is organizing another round of renewable energy auctions to further promote energy production."

As part of this new initiative, Lalaj highlights recent changes in energy legislation: "The government has sent the amendments to the Law On the Promotion of the Use of Energy From Renewable Sources before the relevant parliamentary commissions. They are currently under review and discussion by those bodies. The law aims to provide better regulation and clarity to the sector and its actors."

Considering the recent heightened attention on renewable energy, Lalaj says that work in the legal sector has shifted: "lawyers have been particularly busy figuring out how to help smaller companies operating in the energy sector to engage with investors and enhance their capabilities; or directly assisting the investors to identify potential investments in energy projects and carry out the due diligence on such projects. These discussions are taking place in most of the law firms, and many of us are involved."

In addition to all that, Lalaj notes "there are developments in the capital markets industry. After the approval of the new package of laws on capital markets in 2020, the supervisory authority is now leveling up the approval of a series of secondary legislation that will enable the implementation of said laws and facilitate the operations in the market."

Another important topic being discussed, according to Lalaj, is that changes are expected in Albania's overall legislation, to align with EU acquis: "currently, we are in the screening procedures, and a large part of our institutions are preparing to work towards fully aligning our legislation with the EU acquis." Several legislative proposals are currently in the works, she notes, and will be unveiled in the near future.

Deloitte Legal at a Glance

Deloitte Legal Adriatic is a unique law firm consisting of teams of highly specialized lawyers, providing a vast range of legal services, and part of the commercially integrated Deloitte Legal Group. Deloitte Legal Adriatic has a team of 50 legal professionals, qualified in their jurisdictions, at offices across 8 countries: Albania, Bosnia, Croatia, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Serbia and Slovenia. Across the Adriatic region, our offices assist clients in this interlinked, highly complex, and dynamically developing region. We are among the largest law firms in our jurisdictions and have offices in each of the most important business centers. With a multi-lingual international team, all of whom are fluent in English, we can assist clients through our dedicated language desks including in Chinese, German, French, Russian, and many other languages, including all the Balkan languages.

Deloitte Legal Adriatic’s bundled, technology-enhanced, cross-border capable service array is a step ahead in providing clients with effective business solutions, and in these challenging times is even more important than ever before in our Adriatic Region. Our team has a collaborative orientation as well as the country specific and international legal and business savvy your business needs. Like our clients, we also know that sure success, in addition to everything else, usually requires winners to simply work both harder and smarter. We are here for our clients to do just that.

Across the Adriatic, we offer a full scope of legal services in the main commercial practice areas, including: 

  1. Banking & Finance – regulatory, real estate, syndicated projects, securitization, NPLs, restructuring, and insolvencies
  2. Business Integrity – investigations, compliance, privacy, GDPR, anti-trust, and competition
  3. Corporate – day-to-day operational, governance, and family protocols
  4. Digital – technology, media, and communications
  5. Employment – full spectrum services including mobility services
  6. Environmental – internal/external due diligence, and compliance advice
  7. GDPR – privacy issues, cyber-attacks, AI, legal, technical and organizational aspect of GDPR compliance
  8. Litigation – including tax, white collar, and discovery support services
  9. M&A – including due diligence, JVs/alliances, and post-transaction restructuring
  10. Real Estate & Construction – transactions of all types as well as development & planning
  11. Commercial – including full coverage supply-chain and distribution contractual coverage

Besides traditional legal fields, we are building prominence in growing fields such as Business Integrity, Legal Management Services, Tax Litigation & Controversy, E-commerce, and Fintech. We take pride in being able to pioneer in industries and practices ahead of many other law firms. We have the benefit of accessing cutting-edge data, technical aspects, and operational realities of various industries through our internal Deloitte collaboration with various service lines (Consulting, Financial Advisory, Tax, and others). This market intelligence is again unparalleled among  our competition and presents a wealth of opportunities for genuine insights to evolving trends.

Our client service resonates with an individual approach, genuine relationship building, dedication, availability, efficiency, and high-quality communication, on top of understanding our clients’ commercial, financial and tax needs and the requirements of the market.

Authentic synergies with our financial and tax teams, as well as our colleagues’ professional experience and education, make our firm one of the most experienced, effective and efficient firms in the Adriatic region, with expertise in a wide variety of legal fields. Our positioning on the legal markets has been noticed and recognized by both mainstream international attorneys-ranking agencies – Chambers & Partners, IFLR and the Legal 500, which distinguishes us across all significant legal areas and functions.

Local contacts:

1. Albania and Kosovo

Deloitte Legal Sh.p.k

Sabina Lalaj, Attorney-at-Law, Managing Partner

slalaj@deloitteCE.com

2. Bosnia and Herzegovina

Advokatsko društvo “Legal Partners” d.o.o.

Aida Hamur, Attorney-at-Law 

ahamur@deloittece.com

3. Croatia

Krehić & Partners in cooperation with Deloitte Legal

Tarja Krehić, LL.M. (DUKE)

Attorney-at-Law, Managing Partner

tkrehic@kip-legal.hr

4. Serbia, Montenegro and North Macedonia

Law Office Antonić

Stefan Antonić, independent attorney at law in cooperation with Deloitte Legal

santonic@deloittece.com